The conference programme said: “Drawing on contributions from practitioners, academics and activists, the conference will address issues including what policies have and have not worked in the past, if existing legislation is currently being underused, and how racism impacts on education, in terms of both course content and the careers of students, teachers and lecturers.”
As well as several panels for people to hear the views of both academics and workers, there was a panel arranged that comprised speakers from several political parties, including Gillian Wilson from the Green Party, and Fulton MacGregor from the SNP.
This allowed the parties to address the issue of racism, both how they dealt with it within their own parties, and how they would approach legislating against it.
It also allowed conference attendees to ask their own questions about political responses to the questions raised.
One of the scheduled speakers, Omar Khan, was late and therefore unable to deliver his presentation at the conference.
As a result, the planned breakaway groups weren’t formed and the conference timetable had to be rearranged, meaning the remaining workshop took place before lunch instead of afterwards.
The conference began with an address from the University of Glasgow rector, Aamer Anwar. He started the conference off by noting that there had recently been some problems concerning the Orange Walks which still occur in Glasgow every year.