Supporting diversity and excellence in IOP Awards
The IOP Awards celebrate brilliant physics everywhere. Find out how we’re working to make sure our awards reflect the diversity and excellence of the whole physics community and read more about our awards equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) data.
Brilliant physics is everywhere
The IOP Awards exist to make sure brilliant physics everywhere can shine. Our awards celebrate excellence in technicians, researchers, teachers and innovators – in every part of the UK and Ireland, as well as around the world.
To celebrate the very best in physics, we need to attract nominations from right across the physics community which highlight the achievements of physicists from a truly diverse range of backgrounds.
We particularly want to receive more nominations for women, people from ethnic minorities, disabled people, LGBT+ people and people from disadvantaged backgrounds, as they’ve been less likely to be nominated in previous years.
Doing more to highlight brilliance everywhere
We’ve made some changes to our awards process in recent years to help us attract nominations for under-represented groups within the physics community.
Self-nomination
In 2020, we introduced self-nomination and began publicising the IOP Awards in an even wider range of places.
EDI form and data
As part of our commitment to EDI, we continue to improve our diversity data.
From the 2021 Awards onwards, we have asked all nominees to voluntarily submit EDI. From the 2024 Awards onwards, it is now mandatory to submit an EDI form. Nominators have the option to choose ‘prefer not to say’ for any questions they would rather not answer, but returning the form is obligatory to encourage nominators to share important data.
We also make the data from past IOP Awards available to review.
Nomination guidance
In 2024 we introduced new guidance on how to create a strong nomination to support nominees and nominators who are less familiar with an awards process or have less support to make a nomination.
Diversity in the 2024 IOP Awards
In 2024, we received a high level of strong nominations that resulted in an outstanding cohort of winners, showing the positive impact of these changes.
For the 2025 IOP Awards and beyond, we will continue to work towards ensuring our awards reflect the diversity and excellence of the whole physics community.