EDI criteria (2021/22 academic year)

The EngineeringUK vision for equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) is that young people from all groups are proportionately present in and well prepared for engineering pathways at the age of 19. 

To achieve this, we have an ambition to ensure more diverse young people effectively engage with STEM engagement activities, to inform and inspire them to pursue a career in engineering. 

We know that there are certain groups who are under-represented in the engineering workforce, so we have developed a set of criteria to identify schools who are likely to reach more of young people from groups that are under-represented in the engineering profession. 

We would like to involve more and more of these schools in our programmes and we are also fortunate to have received funding to provide extra bursary support to such schools to participate in STEM engagement. 

Groups we are particularly targeting include: 

  • those from lower socioeconomic backgrounds 
  • young people who identify as female 
  • young people from ethnic minority groups 
  • young people with SEN/disabilities 
  • young people in a range of localities including rural areas. 

Only secondary schools are included in the EDI criteria for the year 2021/22, but it is envisaged that in future years we may develop similar measures for primary schools. 

We consider a school to meet our EDI criteria if they are: 

  • Equal to or above national average in both free school meals (FSM) and proportion of ethnic minority students (middle column) 

or 

  • Equal to or above one of the ‘significantly above average’ criteria (right hand column)​ 

 

National average  (median) 

Significantly above average   

England 

 

(Top 30% FSM1, Top 25% ethnic minority students) 

Free school meal eligibility* 

≥ 18.5% 

≥ 25.8% 

Ethnic minority students 

≥ 22.8% 

≥ 54.3% 

SEND students 

- 

SEN schools/PRU 

Rural location 

- 

rural settlement (less than 10,000 people), sparse area2 

Wales 

 

(Top 25% FSM, Top 25% ethnic minority students) 

Free school meal eligibility* 

≥ 17.3% 

≥ 28.0% 

Ethnic minority students 

≥ 7.4% 

≥ 17.8% 

SEND students 

- 

SEN schools/PRU 

Rural location 

- 

(Data unavailable – identify this manually) 

Scotland 

 

(Top 25% FSM, Top 25% ethnic minority students) 

Free school meal eligibility* 

≥ 17.1% 

≥ 22.9% 

Ethnic minority students 

≥ 5.3% 

≥ 12.8% 

SEND students 

- 

SEN schools/PRU 

Rural location 

 

settlement of less than 10,000 people with a drive time of over 30 minutes to a settlement of 10,000 or more 

Northern Ireland  

 

(Top 40%FSM, no ethnicity data available) 

Free school meal eligibility* 

- 

≥ 34.7% 

SEND students 

-  

SEN schools/PRU 

Rural location 

- 

(Data unavailable – identify manually) 

 

Gender 

Single-sex girls schools who have above average proportions of pupils eligible for free school meals OR above average proportions of students from ethnic minority backgrounds meet the EDI criteria. This is a lower threshold than for other mainstream schools, in order to prioritise schools that have 100% girls of whom a high proportion are also from lower socio-economic groups or ethnic minority backgrounds.  

Programme participants from co-ed schools should be at least 50% female unless there is a good case otherwise. 

Additional notes 

We will use the 2020/21 data for schools to assess whether they meet our EDI criteria. 

For reference, between 38% and 54% of schools in the UK meet the EDI criteria (this varies by country). These percentages do not include special schools as 100% of special schools meet the criteria.