Participatory Audit Guide
The full youth-led method to audit gender equality in your institution — principles, phases and how to act on the findings.
StudentsTeaching staffAdministration & staffLeadership
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Toolkit
A step-by-step guide to promoting gender equality and diversity on campus — with ready-to-use tools for students, teaching staff, administration and leadership.
It turns the Labs 4 Change method into a practical, modular path. Follow the five steps in order, or adapt them to your context.
How to use it
Each step explains why it matters, what to do and who to involve. Run it as a small coordinating team or with a broader group — and adapt the tools to your campus rather than applying them as a rigid model.
The five steps
- 01Step 01
Diagnosis
Understand where your institution stands before acting.
Build a shared baseline from the data and gender diagnoses you already have.
Administration & staffLeadershipSee how
What you’ll do
- Gather existing equality data, plans and prior diagnoses
- Connect the dots and spot the gaps
- Agree a clear, shared starting point
Who’s involved
Equality units · Leadership · Coordinating team
Tip from the field: You rarely start from zero — most institutions already hold useful data. The work is connecting it.
- 02Step 02
A network of gender & diversity experts
Build a feminist-informed network to guide the whole process.
Bring together people with gender, diversity and participatory expertise — inside and outside the university — to advise, facilitate and keep the process critical and intersectional.
Administration & staffLeadershipTeaching staffSee how
What you’ll do
- Define the network’s role: advisory, mentoring, validation
- Seek diverse profiles and lived experience, not only credentials
- Agree how often you meet and how you decide
- Involve them across every later step
Who’s involved
Gender & diversity experts · Feminist researchers & practitioners · Equality staff · A coordinating organisation
Tip from the field: A small, committed network beats a large, formal one. Start building it early.
- 03Step 03
A virtual gender & diversity academy
Give participants a shared foundation to see and analyse campus life through a gender lens.
An online academy and webinars so students and staff gain the concepts, ethics and observation skills to take part meaningfully — not just symbolically.
StudentsTeaching staffAdministration & staffSee how
What you’ll do
- Set clear learning objectives: knowledge, skills, attitudes
- Design core modules: intersectionality, power in higher education, gender-based violence, ethical observation
- Mix formats: live sessions, real cases, reflection, practical assignments
- Connect it directly to the audit that follows
Who’s involved
Gender & diversity experts as trainers · Project coordinators · Students & staff · Communication & technical support
Tip from the field: Keep it interactive and example-based, and make materials reusable throughout the project.
- 04Step 04
Mapping equality: the participatory audit
Make everyday, often invisible inequalities visible — together.
A participatory audit, led by a trained student core group, that observes spaces, teaching, communication and social dynamics, then turns observations into a shared diagnosis and clear priorities.
StudentsTeaching staffAdministration & staffLeadershipSee how
What you’ll do
- Define what to observe: governance, teaching, facilities, communication, social dynamics
- Adapt the observation tools (templates below)
- Form a diverse student observation team
- Observe ethically over time, then analyse together
- Prioritise the key challenges for the Living Labs
Who’s involved
A trained student core group · Gender & diversity experts (facilitation) · An institutional coordinator
Tip from the field: Focus on systems and practices, never on monitoring individuals. Treat the results as collective knowledge, not complaints.
- 05Step 05
Living Labs: co-creating action plans
Turn the audit’s priorities into concrete, co-created solutions.
Safe, structured spaces where students, experts and staff move from diagnosis to action — designing and prototyping real proposals.
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What you’ll do
- Reframe priorities as clear, actionable challenges
- Design each lab: objectives, sessions, methods
- Assemble a diverse group around each challenge
- Facilitate co-creation and prototype solutions
- Document and share the outcomes
Who’s involved
Students from the audit · Gender & diversity experts (facilitation) · Academic & administrative staff · Decision-makers, where relevant
Tip from the field: Value small, feasible changes alongside ambitious ones. Labs are seeds for ongoing change, not one-off events.
Tools & resources
Ready-to-use templates and guides from the audit (Step 4). Download, use and adapt them.
Equality Explorers
A gamified exploration of five zones — spaces, participation, materials, roles and language — to surface hidden traces of inequality on campus.
StudentsTeaching staff
Download Document Review Template
A structured sheet to assess policies, plans and official documents against the equality indicators, recording evidence and an initial rating.
Administration & staffLeadership
Download Participant Observation Template
A field template to observe spaces — signage, campaigns, care spaces, inclusive language and imagery — and capture what they reveal.
StudentsTeaching staff
Download Student Survey Template
A ready survey on students’ profile, perceived climate and treatment, knowledge of protocols and suggestions — with an intersectional lens.
Students
Download Key Informant Interview Guide
A guide to interview Equality Unit staff about policies, protocols, training, challenges and what would strengthen gender equality.
Administration & staffLeadership
Download Focus Group Guide
A facilitation guide to explore how students perceive anti-harassment measures, their effectiveness and how to improve them.
StudentsAdministration & staff
Download