by Zarus Cenac
UK higher education is known to have too few Black professors (eg Hubbard, 2026). The presence of Black professors can be thought about by looking at 1) the number of Black professors or 2) the percentage of professors who are Black (Adisa et al, 2025; Gibney, 2024). The number/percentage has been referred to, for instance, in journal articles (Adisa et al, 2025; Arday, 2022), the media (Coughlan, 2021), and in the House of Lords (House of Lords, 2025). We can keep an eye on the number, or the percentage, to have an idea about if the situation is improving (Gibney, 2024; Nowell, 2025). So, is it not vital that we have accurate numbers and percentages? In a recent post on SRHE Blog, I considered how to statistically analyse the representation of Black professors in different ways –analyses showed that Black professors are underrepresented (Cenac, 2026a). In the present blog post, I discuss issues with the apparent number of Black professors and the apparent percentage of professors who are Black – this blog post asks if we actually know the number and the percentage (Figure 1), and this blog post considers if we really should say that Black people are underrepresented in the professoriate.
Figure 1: Factors Which May Affect Our Measurement of the Black Presence in the Professoriate
Note. Figure 1 is based on the literature/data (Dembosky et al, 2019; HESA, 2026; Gibney, 2022). See the main text for full explanations. HESA is the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA, nd-a).
The number of Black professors
When people wish to say how many Black professors there are, a source they can use is the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) (eg Essilfie-Quaye et al, 2025; Gibney, 2024) who “are the experts in UK higher education data” (HESA, nd-a, para 1). However, there are two points to consider: firstly, we should be mindful of how HESA categorises an academic as a professor (HESA, nd-b), and, secondly, ethnicity is unknown for a proportion of professors in the HESA data (HESA, 2026). Those two points are discussed next.
Professors in HESA data
In the HESA data, a professor may be classified as a professor (HESA, 2026, nd-c). Alternatively, a professor can be categorised into a different senior group for academics, for example, if the professor’s role is managerial (HESA, 2026; nd-c). So, there is a good chance that the HESA professor category shows us fewer professors than there truly are, and HESA are open about this (HESA, 2026) – see Figure 2. The different senior group is not limited to professors (HESA, 2026, nd-b); from looking through the HESA website (HESA, nd-b; 2024, 2026), HESA seem not to have data which specifies how many professors there are in the different senior group (eg overall or for Black professors).
Going by HESA data (HESA, 2024; 2026) and literature on the presence of Black professors, we can see instance after instance where the number of Black professors (eg Arday, 2022; Essilfie-Quaye et al, 2025; Gibney, 2024; Nowell, 2025) seems to have been derived from the HESA professor category, and (to my knowledge) without mentioning the issue that the HESA professor category may not include all professors because some professors are potentially being put into the different senior group. If awareness of this issue is not as good as it should be, perhaps HESA should consider if the issue could be communicated more obviously, for example, referring to it just before/after the table in HESA (2024) or HESA (2026) which breaks down the HESA professor category by ethnic group.
Figure 2: Black Female Professors
Note. Figure 2 refers to WHEN Equality (2026) and uses data from HESA (nd-d).
Unknown ethnicity
Ethnicity is not known for all academics in the HESA professor category (HESA, 2026). For example, ethnicity it is not known for 2,210 of those professors in the 2024–25 academic year (HESA, 2026). Because of this, we really should expect the number given for Black professors in the HESA professor category to be fewer than the true number of Black professors.
The percentage (proportion) of professors who are Black
If we want to see how well Black professors are represented, we can look to the percentage or proportion of people in the HESA professor category who are Black (eg Adisa et al, 2025; Cenac, 2026a; Essilfie-Quaye et al, 2025). For instance, statistical analyses (of people whose ethnicity is known) indicate that Black people are substantially less represented in the HESA professor category than they are in 1) the UK working-age population overall (Cenac, 2026a), and 2) an older section of the UK working-age population (Cenac, 2026b). Next, we will consider (in two ways) if percentages (proportions) from the HESA professor category actually are useful for looking into the representation of Black academics.
Professors in the HESA data
As covered earlier in this blog post, in the HESA data, professors can be in the professor category or the different senior group (HESA, 2026). We do not know if the percentage of professors who are Black would be different in the HESA professor category than it is for professors in the HESA different senior group. In the HESA data, professors with (at least) a certain level of seniority will not be categorised as professors, instead being put into the different senior group (HESA, 2026). Black representation is known to decrease the higher up people are in the academic hierarchy, from undergraduate student to professor (eg Gibney, 2022). So, it would not be surprising if Black representation is greater amongst the HESA professor category than amongst professors in the different senior group. Therefore, the percentage of Black people in the HESA professor category could be higher than the true percentage of professors who are Black. This means that the notable underrepresentation of Black people in the HESA professor category (Cenac, 2026a) would likely be found even if analysis included professors from the different senior group.
On the other hand, out of people whose ethnicity is known, Black people are 1.13% of the HESA professor category in 2024–25 (Cenac, 2026a), but 1.69% of the different senior group in the HESA (2026) data for 2024–25. So, it might not be the case that Black people are represented worse in the HESA professor category than they are amongst professors in the different senior group.
In the HESA (2026) data for 2024–25, there are nearly four times as many people in the professor category than in the different senior group. Therefore, findings with the HESA professor category are likely to be representative of what is happening with professors in general. So, it does seem useful to use percentages from the HESA professor category if we wish to know about the representation of Black professors.
Unknown ethnicity
Ethnicity is not known for some academics in the HESA data (HESA, 2026). When it comes to people giving their racial or ethnic background in a survey, some people refrain from giving their background (Dembosky et al, 2019). This refraining is suggested to not be the same across different backgrounds, with results indicating that Black people refrain the most whilst the group who refrain the least are White people who are other than Hispanic (Dembosky et al, 2019). If Black professors hold back on declaring their background more than other groups of professors, that could make it seem like the percentage of professors who are Black is lower than it truly is. However, the difference in the rate at which Black people and non-Hispanic White people refrain from giving their background (in a survey) is suggested to not even be 4% (Dembosky et al, 2019) – a difference in rates would probably not be an issue when it comes to using the HESA professor category for looking into the representation of Black professors.
Conclusion
The HESA professor category probably does not show us how many Black professors there really are, giving us a number which is lower than the true number of Black professors (eg Figure 2). Although HESA are forthcoming about how professors can be partitioned between the HESA professor category and the different senior group (eg HESA, 2026), HESA should consider if they can convey this better. Even if there truly are more Black professors than the HESA professor category suggests, this blog post is not implying that Black academics are well represented in the professoriate. Overall, the percentage (proportion) of Black professors in the HESA professor category shows a marked underrepresentation (Cenac, 2026a), and, as discussed above, that percentage should give us a good indication of the true representation (the underrepresentation) of Black professors despite factors which may somewhat affect how good the percentage is at indicating how the situation really is (Figure 1). So, when the HESA professor category is used to explore the presence of Black professors, far more emphasis should be put on the percentage or proportion of professors who are Black rather than the number of Black professors.
Zarus Cenac has worked at UK universities, for example, he was a visiting lecturer at City, University of London. He is currently an administrator at UCL. His interests include race and ethnicity from an interdisciplinary perspective.
