LJMU awarded top marks in Stonewall guide

25 June 2012

LJMU is one of seven universities awarded top marks in the Stonewall Gay By Degree guide, the only guide profiling the UK's 150 universities to show how gay-friendly they are.

Gay By Degree uses ten criteria to identify how well universities support gay people, including whether they have a policy to tackle homophobic bullying, whether there are societies and events for lesbian, gay and bisexual students and whether they support gay staff effectively.

Now online at www.gaybydegree.org.uk, it gives lesbian, gay and bisexual prospective students a single place to find out what each university offers to support them before they apply for places in 2013, so they can find a place to study where they will feel comfortable to be themselves. This year the guide's website has been optimised for mobile devices so prospective students can use it wherever they are.

Stonewall Head of Education Wes Streeting said:

"For the third year running, Stonewall's Gay By Degree is the only place where gay prospective students can find everything they need to know about their options in one place online, wherever they are. Finding a good uni is challenging, and we're delighted to be there to help people make their choice. This year we also hope current students use the guide as a way to encourage universities to improve what they're doing to support gay people."

LJMU has achieved a place in the Stonewall Top 100 Employers list for the last three years and this year awarded Star Performer Network status in recognition of the University's excellent LGBT equality practice.

Meriel Box, Chair, LGBT Staff Network commented:

"We are very proud to be an exemplar university leading the sector in our LGB equality practice. Our submission to the Gay By Degree benchmarking exercise for LGB student support was a team effort; involving LGBT Staff Network members, our Equality and Diversity Adviser, colleagues within Student Advice and Wellbeing, World of Work Careers Centre and LiverpoolSU."

If you want to make a difference and support our wider LGBT community please contact: Meriel Box, AEU, Head of Staff Development, M.Box@ljmu.ac.uk or Moni Akinsanya, Equality and Diversity Adviser M.M.Akinsanya@ljmu.ac.uk