Gender Equality and Inclusion in Distance Education: Future perspectives of Students in the Global North and South (GIF_Stud)

Project duration

1 June 2026 – 28 February 2027

Funding body

Internal Research Funding for Gender Studies, under the Equality Strategy 2025–2028

Project description

Within the context of distance education, this project examines the diversity dimension of gender and addresses the question: How can inclusive distance education be conceptualised from the students’ perspective?

The FernUniversität in Hagen aims to provide equal educational opportunities for all individuals, regardless of their social background. Inclusion is an approach which, in line with the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, refers to the right to education for people with disabilities and requires appropriate access and suitable educational settings. Inclusive education thus aims to enable all students to participate equally in education. It remains to be seen what role the category of gender plays within this understanding. To this end, the project is based on an understanding of intersectionality, which describes overlaps and interactions between different social categories and dimensions of diversity. This is necessary because groups of students continue to experience discrimination, for example on the grounds of gender, age, or disability.

To gain insights applicable to different contexts, this study focuses on two distance-learning universities: the FernUniversität in Hagen (Global North) and the University of South Africa (UNISA) (Global South), building upon a preliminary policy and document analysis of existing understandings of inclusion at these institutions. The significance of gender as a category is therefore to be clarified within the context of inclusive distance education and the framework of participatory futures research. By applying and adapting the Future Workshop method according to Jungk & Müllert (1981), approaches to integrating the gender perspective into inclusion measures in distance learning are to be outlined.

Project objectives

• Sharpening of the gender perspective in the FernUniversität’s understanding of inclusion.
• Further development of the Future Workshop method for distance learners with reference to the dimensions of diversity.
• Derivation of insights into curriculum development and an inclusive and gender-sensitive distance learning programme.
• Impulses for the further development of inclusion- and gender-sensitive measures in distance learning, as well as contributions to the methodological development of design-oriented gender research.

Project participants

Prof Eva Cendon, Institute for Educational Science and Media Research/Department of Adult and Continuing Education, FernUniversität in Hagen

Irina Haury, M.A., Institute of Educational Science and Media Research/Department of Adult and Continuing Education, FernUniversität in Hagen

External partners

Prof Mpine Makoe, Institute for Open Distance Learning, University of South Africa, ZA

Contact

For questions regarding the project: irina.haury

Contact details for the department: ewb