Complete the 2025 staff inclusivity survey

Dear colleagues

The University of Cape Town (UCT) invites all staff members to take part in the 2025 Staff Inclusivity Survey, a confidential follow-up to the groundbreaking 2019 baseline survey.

In 2018, UCT launched a bold, university-wide effort to shift its culture toward true inclusion – bringing together staff, students, unions, human resources and leadership in an unprecedented collaboration.

A year later, the first-ever Staff Inclusivity Survey followed. This survey gave UCT vital baseline data on inclusion, belonging and workplace culture.

Since then, staff members’ voices have driven meaningful change. From 2020 to 2025, UCT has:

• developed new programmes to address bullying, emotional wellbeing, harassment and discrimination
• established the Transformation Benchmarks to guide institution-wide efforts, aligned with the national Transformation Barometer
• rolled out initiatives led by senior academics and professional staff, all designed to create a more welcoming and respectful working environment.

These actions were monitored through UCT’s Annual Transformation Reports and remain publicly accessible on the UCT Transformation Overview site. However, deeper work needs to be undertaken in the critical areas of belonging and inclusivity at UCT.

UCT has again partnered with Aephoria – an independent, expert organisation – to conduct the survey. Aephoria’s InclusionIndex tool is globally respected and scientifically validated to measure inclusion, belonging and workplace climate.

Through the survey, the university can:

• track progress since 2019
• evaluate the impact of interventions (2020–2025)
• inform the next wave of strategies for 2026–2030
• ensure accountability and ongoing transformation.

The survey is administered independently by Aephoria, all responses will be completely anonymous – no identifying information will be shared with UCT. Aephoria will analyse the data and provide findings in aggregated form only.

The first phase of the survey will be conducted from 21 August to 13 September 2025, and can be completed online or on paper in English, Afrikaans or isiXhosa.

The next phase will be conducted through interviews and focus groups, scheduled to take place from 6 October to 31 October 2025. These voluntary deep-dive sessions will further explore themes that emerge from the survey.

Staff will receive personalised emails containing a link to complete the voluntary survey. Findings and clear action steps will be shared openly with the UCT community until the end of March 2026.

Each and every staff member is encouraged to engage fully in this process because:

• staff members’ voices influence UCT’s future policies and culture
• this survey has a proven track record where previous results have led to visible, incremental change
• this is an opportunity to help create a more respectful, inclusive workplace
• confidentiality is guaranteed and all information received will be anonymised.

To find out more, please visit UCT’s Inclusivity Strategy web pages for full details of past and ongoing interventions; ethical clearance documentation; and the survey’s FAQs.

Office for Inclusivity and Change

Read previous communications:

• From the UCT Executive
• Campus Announcements