Canberra Institute of Technology developing gender equality action plan
Canberra Institute of Technology (CIT) has partnered with Our Watch, a national violence prevention organisation, to take action to prevent violence against women and gender-based violence and improve equity and equality. Since 2023, CIT and Our Watch have worked in partnership to implement the Respect and Equality framework across the whole institute.
TAFEs can help to create an Australia where women are safe, equal and valued. The Respect and Equality framework supports TAFEs to embed gender equality, which in turn will help to end violence against women and gender-based violence. Gender equality is critical to not only a thriving VET sector, but a healthy society. It is a mandatory obligation under new Positive Duty Standards (more information in this link to Our Watch website) and improves recruitment, retention, and performance of staff and students.
Respect and Equality includes a four-step approach:
- Engage TAFE leadership to form a working group to actively take steps to prevent violence against women and gender based violence
- Conducting a self-assessment of gender equality across the institute.
- Co-developing a Gender Equality Action Plan (GEAP) with the Working Group.
- Implementing the GEAP.
As TAFEs are encouraged to adopt the framework using language that best aligns to their existing strategies, CIT has chosen to name its GEAP the ‘gender equity action plan’.
CIT is currently in the third step of this process and is finalising their gender equity action plan to be launched in September 2024. It will be implemented over two years The development of a gender equity action plan across all 5 domains is an incredible achievement and, once launched, CIT will be leading the way to prevent violence against women across the entire TAFE community. Our Watch website will have updates on progress..
GEAPs can include practical measures, such as:
- establishing mechanisms to collect information about student and staff safety and equality.
- developing and implementing a targeted and scaffolded training and capacity building program for all staff to support violence prevention work.
- clear and consistent gender-inclusive messaging to current and prospective students across entire lifecycle of the student journey.
- developing networks or systems for information sharing about existing and incoming partnerships across colleges and divisions.
To learn more about the Respect and Equality framework, visit the Our Watch website or contact Katie Yates Burgess from Our Watch katie.yates@ourwatch.org.au.
If you need support or know someone that does you can call the national hotline 1800 Respect.
