by Freddie Attenborough, The Critic
King’s College London drops “diversity statement” requirement after free speech concerns
King’s College London (KCL) has scrapped a requirement for job applicants to submit a “diversity statement” following pressure from academic freedom campaigners, in one of the first signs that the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act 2023, which came fully into force in England on 1st August, is beginning to bite.
The job listing, posted on 12th August for a lectureship in music history at the prestigious Russell Group institution, originally asked candidates not only for a CV and covering letter but also for “a separate document… describing their past/current experience of supporting student welfare and equality, diversity and inclusion in the higher education context”. By the following week that requirement had vanished, marking a quiet climbdown and a win for academic freedom.
KCL is hardly unique. Large public university systems in the United States began adopting these requirements during the 2010s. By 2019, every campus in the University of California system had implemented mandatory EDI statements for faculty applicants, with some committees even using them as a first-round filter to cut down the applicant pool before reviewing academic qualifications.