Is positive action an effective tool to address inequalities in challenging times?

Despite law permitting limited positive action initiatives to combat inequalities faced by marginalised groups since the mid-1970s in the UK, the subject has notoriously been a neglected and highly controversial area. This lecture will explore the case for using positive action as an effective tool to address inequalities in challenging times and encourage a reassessment of the benefits of appropriately framed preferential treatment.

After graduating with a Law degree from Oxford University, Chantal Davies qualified as a solicitor with Eversheds in Cardiff specialising in Employment, Human Rights and Discrimination Law. In 1998, she moved to work as a solicitor for the Equal Opportunities Commission (EOC) in Manchester heading up a Department tackling strategic and wider enforcement of the gender equality legislation. Chantal is now professor of Law, Equality and Diversity in the School of Law at the University of Chester. She has also developed and is Director of the Forum for Research into Equality and Diversity. Past research focuses on the experiences of minority ethnic students within HE and the use of positive action by organisations in the UK. Chantal has also completed a funded project looking at the gendered obstacles to research activity faced by academics in the UK. More recently Chantal has been funded by the Young Women’s Trust and the Equality and Human Rights Commission to research the use of positive action in apprenticeships. Chantal has also worked with the Higher Education Authority in Ireland to roll out a ground breaking positive action initiative aimed at increasing female representation within professorships. She has sat on the board of Cheshire Halton and Warrington Race and Equality Centre and the Equality Challenge Unit and in this latter role worked with them to develop institutional confidence in developing positive action initiatives within higher education. Chantal also sat on the review panel for the national Subject Benchmark Statement for Law. Chantal currently sits on the Sustainable and Inclusive Growth Commission and is also co-vice chair of the Law Society’s Women’s Law Division Committee. She has also recently been appointed to sit on AdvanceHE’s Equality Diversity and Inclusion Committee.

Forget What You Think You Know: 4 Lessons on Sustainable Edu-Practice Across Global Lines

Here Chiedza will share four transformative lessons from their time leading a literacy project in Ghana, which reshaped their approach to education activism. They will discuss Adaptation—the need to shed a UK-centric perspective and embrace Ghana's unique cultural, economic, and infrastructural realities. Second, they will explore Inclusion, recognising that while race is central in their UK work, Ghana revealed new priorities like gender inequality, tribalism, and classism. Third, they'll highlight Education as empowerment, emphasising that real change begins by shifting mindsets, fostering growth over stagnation. Finally, they'll delve into Sustainability, showing how true impact lies in nurturing local change agents who carry lessons forward, creating broader, lasting change. This talk challenges common assumptions and offers insights into creating sustainable educational practices across diverse global contexts.

Chiedza Ikpeh is a Zimbabwean-born education activist dedicated to driving meaningful change across the education landscape and beyond. With a rich academic background spanning Psychology and Human Resource Management, she is currently the Director of the RARA Education Project, an Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI) Consultant, a podcast host, a Doctoral Researcher, and a Multi-Academy Trustee Director. Combined with her doctoral research, expertise, experience, and passion, Chiedza's talk will delve into the intricate dynamics surrounding the visibility and representation of ethnically minoritised individuals or groups, in the workplace and wider society.

The Power of Asking: How Consumers Can Demand a Sustainable Future

As both a product designer and a consumer, I’ve seen firsthand how products are made - and how they often fall short when it comes to sustainability. This isn’t due to technical limitations but a lack of real pressure for change. While regulation is on the horizon, we, as consumers, have the power to act now. By demanding repairability, durability, and responsible end-of-life solutions, we can push brands to do better. Let’s start a conversation about what we truly want from the products we buy - and use our collective voice to shape a more sustainable future.

I'm a product designer specialising in user-centred and sustainability-focused design for early-stage hardware innovators. I have worked across the consumer and medical sectors have worked on a wide variety of products including inhalers, medical pagers, pressure cookers and even a Quidditch goal.

I founded People Planet Product in 2024 in order to address a gap between early-stage innovative ideas, and technical product development. I would like to help innovators embed responsible development techniques into their projects and am passionate about helping them to develop products people want, and that align with the needs of the planet.

Build Back Together: Connecting the dots between adaptation, inclusion and empowerment

Adaptation measures for at-risk communities should provide them with a competitive advantage. If we want to make adaptive interventions sustainable, they need to be socially accepted. Hence, acceptance by the community directly involved in the intervention is likely to succeed when the overarching process of community engagement is embedded in its design. Consideration of inclusivity in stakeholder engagement from the beginning of the design process helps to empower communities to own the solutions. Bringing on-ground experience, the talk will focus on three key themes: complexities in prioritisation in an uncertain climate, inclusivity in design implementation, and creating a feedback loop for long-term sustainability for an empowered community.

Namrata Bhattacharya Mis is an Associate Professor (Disaster Risk and Resilience) in Geography and Environment in the Faculty of Social Science at University of Chester. She is a geographer by training and passionate about understanding the connectivity's between nature and society in the context of disaster management. She is actively involved in multidisciplinary research related to understanding and managing water extremes and socio-economic vulnerabilities, particularly in flood risk management. Her teaching experience spans across Geography, International Development Studies, and Natural Hazard Management, with a recent focus on using innovative technologies to enhance inclusion in disaster management. Namrata is also the Co-Chair of university Race Equality And Cultural Heritage Group and she works constantly towards enhancing equality and diversity in HE.