RRI Tools

The Gender in Research Toolkit and Training project strives to promote gender equality and excellence in scientific research by facilitating the participation of women scientists, promoting equal opportunities for women and men and integrating the gender dimension into research content in all research areas.

The project, coordinated by Yellow Window and funded by the European Commission under the Seventh Framework Programme for Research (FP7), has created toolkit and training packages aimed at:

• raising awareness of gender in research among actors in the implementation of FP7
• providing practical guidance and suggestions on increasing female participation in EU-funded research and integrating the gender/sex dimension in research content
• strengthening participants’ advocacy and argumentation skills.

The Toolkit and Training is divided into three parts: 

• Part 1: an overall introduction to gender in research
• Part 2: how to make research gender sensitive (includes a checklist)
• Part 3: gender in nine specific research fields (health, environment, science in society, etc.)

Parts 1 and 2 provide an overview of how the gender dimension can be integrated into a research project, while in Part 3, real-life examples and useful references illustrate how planned research can be made gender sensitive.

Though the Toolkit and Training follows FP7 guidelines on gender, its contents can be easily adapted to the specifications of other programmes (e.g., Horizon 2020, national programmes). Of course, the budget and time needed to apply Toolkit and Training suggestions will be highly context dependent.

The Gender in EU-funded Research project concluded in 2012. During the project, several training sessions were conducted, but no material about these sessions is available online.