Richard Collier-Keywood was Global Vice-Chairman of PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) from 2012 until February 2017 having previously served as PwC UK Managing Partner since 2008. In his final role, Richard chaired the Global PwC Network Executive Team and was responsible for everything from strategy through operations. Since February 2017, Richard has taken on a number of roles including chairing the School for Social Entrepreneurs, chairing Humentum, a global NGO based in Washington DC, chairing New Forest Care, a child care company specialising in looking after some of the most behaviourally challenged children in the UK, Managing Partner of Nala Ventures & Investments LLP and is a senior adviser to DCMS on the Inclusive Economy.
Richard is a barrister and a fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England & Wales.
Rachel Macfarlane is the Director of Education Services at Herts for Learning. From 2007 until 2018 she was a National Leader of Education, serving as Headteacher of three contrasting schools over a sixteen year period. In 2011 Rachel joined Ark Schools to set up a new co-educational, all-through academy for 4-18 year olds in Ilford, East London. This was judged to be outstanding in all areas by Ofsted in 2014 and again in 2018.
From 2009-2018 Rachel was Project Director of The London Leadership Strategy’s Going For Great (G4G) Programme, which involved working with leaders of outstanding schools to share good practice and produce case studies for dissemination to London schools. Rachel sat on the RSC’s Headteacher Board for NE London & the East of England Region.
Rachel is an honorary fellow at the UCL Institute of Education’s Centre for Educational
Leadership. She is a fellow of the CCT. Rachel has written and contributed to a number of books on the themes of educational disadvantage, the features of great schools and learning power approaches to education. Her latest book, Obstetrics for Schools, was published in 2021.
Ed Fidoe is the co-founder of School 21, and is now working to create a new, innovative institution in the Higher Education sector.
After leaving McKinsey in 2010 to start School 21 Ed has also advised leaders at Cambridge University, the London School of Economics, ARK Schools, Teach First, and Eton College. He is also the co-founder of EDSPACE, a co-working space for innovative education companies. Previously he was a theatre producer.
Sally is Chief People Officer at Fidelity International (FIL) with responsibility for global human resources and corporate affairs. She also has an oversight role for the People Agenda within Eight Roads, a global proprietary investment firm backed by Fidelity. Sally is a member of the Remuneration Committees for FIL and Eight Roads as well as the Remuneration Committees for COLT and Optegra which are Eight Roads portfolio companies.
She has been at Fidelity for 20 years. Prior to this, Sally worked at PwC in Human Resources for 12 years in various leadership roles.
Sally graduated from King’s College, London with a BA (Hons) in English, and is also a qualified secondary school teacher with a PGCE in English language and literature. She is a Trustee on the Board of Future First, an education charity building alumni communities in state schools across the UK.
She is a fellow of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development.
Helen is Chief Executive Officer of The Young Foundation, leading a multi-disciplinary team of researchers, innovators and social investors to support stronger communities across the UK. In 2019, the Young Foundation launched the new Institute for Community Studies; creating a platform for institutions to better understand – and more equitably involve – local communities.
Prior to joining The Young Foundation in October 2017, Helen was Executive Director at Nesta, responsible for leading their Innovation Lab supporting and scaling innovation in the arts, civil society, government and education sectors. Previous roles have included work within the private sector developing digital strategies and solutions for global corporate clients. She spent five years consulting in the Cabinet Office, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister and then DCLG developing national innovation programmes for local government and leading research and product development for interactive TV public services.
Helen was awarded an OBE for services to development of sustainable communities in the 2023 New Year Honours List.
John Krumins is Chairman of Wavex Ltd, a city-based IT services provider and sits on a series of technology and service sector company Boards with a particular focus on data and digital technology. In education he is passionate on the importance of oracy as a key skill for all young people and teach secondary school students communication, interview and networking skills.
Before his current roles he first trained as a chemical engineer, and then spent over 25 years in a range of strategic consulting and corporate finance roles advising multi-national companies particularly in the media, technology and industrial services sectors, and also served as a Panel Member at the Competition and Markets Authority, assessing competition issues for the Government.
Sarah Sodeau has been a Head of Division within the Internal Audit department at the Bank of England since 2015.
Sarah has worked in various audit, risk assurance and consultancy roles over the past 30 years across a range of different sectors including pharmaceuticals, retail, luxury goods and financial services. Sarah also served as a member of the Salvation Army Housing Association’s Audit Committee from 2006 to 2017.
Since 2011, Claire has been a governor and, until recently was Chair of the Advisory Board, at Surrey Square Primary School.
Claire has a degree in Modern and Medieval Languages from Cambridge University.
Carla is a trans-disciplinary thought leader and practitioner in LearnTech and EdTech, informed by the Learning Sciences and Learner-Centric design. She was Director of Futures at UCL – Institute of Education and Global Digital Director Education at Cambridge University Press. She set up and ran an interdisciplinary EdTech Think Tank, the Tmrw Institute, which engaged with politicians, policy makers, academia, educators, EdTech and practitioners considering international key challenges and digital trends in education and learning.
She is a member of the advisory board of ErasmusX at Erasmus University Rotterdam, the steering committee of DEFI at Cambridge University WEF’s Expert Network for AI and the working group on AI and Youngsters.
Carla founded Refracted!, an online trans-disciplinary community on learning and translational research. She also mentors EdTech start-ups.
She is currently working at Hodder Education on Digital Strategy and Transformation.
Baz Ramaiah is Head of Policy at The Centre for Education and Youth.
Baz has spent nearly all of his professional career working in education. After working as a special educational needs teaching assistant, he spent five years teaching Religious Education and Psychology in inner city schools in East London and Manchester. He stumbled out of the classroom and into educational technology, joining the founding team of Teacher Booker while completing an MPhil in Psychology at the University of Cambridge, where his field work involved teaching and researching oracy in two Pupil Referral Units in London. He then joined Teacher Tapp, the UK’s biggest daily survey of teachers, as Research & Programmes Lead, where he led an Innovate UK-funded trial of daily teacher surveying in Ghana.
Baz researches and holds expertise on a wide range of areas of education and youth services. He has written on issues related to education, politics and data for The Evening Standard, Schools Week, Teach Primary, Teach Secondary, Cambridge University Press, The Tribune and The Jacobin. He appears regularly on broadcast media to discuss issues in education and youth policy from a politically progressive perspective.
Sara is Head of School Improvement and Standards at Ivy Learning Trust and has wide experience at senior leadership level. This includes being a headteacher in two London authorities.
She is a lead Ofsted Inspector and has also served as one of Her Majesty’s Inspectors for the London region.
Andrew has supplied products and services to the education industry for over 35 years, in that time creating and delivering market-leading learning and teaching content, formative assessments, professional development and training courses, and back office services to Multi Academy Trusts andschools.
Andrew has worked at a senior director level for a variety of companies involved in supporting leaders, teachers and students, at home and internationally, including Optimus Education, Real Group, Prospects Services, GL Education Group, Pearson and RSAcademics. He was Director of Content at the British Educational Communications and Technology Agency (Becta), a government
non-departmental body focused on delivering teaching and learning in schools through technology.
Andrew has been chair of the two main trade associations that represent suppliers of education services to MATs and schools: the British Educational Suppliers Association (BESA), and the Educational Publishers Council (EPC).
Andrew believes passionately in the importance of school improvement so that all young people are supported to identify and then achieve their life chances. With that in mind, he holds several other relevant non-executive positions: Andrew is a trustee of the Academies Enterprise Trust, one of the largest academy chains in England serving over 33,000 students; chair of the charity Yes Futures, a
not-for-profit which delivers programmes to schools to support the development of confidence and resilience in young people; and a non-executive director of the Confederation of School Trusts Professional Development Ltd, the sector body for MATs and Free Schools advocating for, connecting and supporting executive and governance leaders.
Marie Williams is passionate about child development through play and creative problem solving. Throughout her academic and professional career she has actively volunteered in organisations working to empower and enable disadvantaged children to grow in confidence, STEM and team working skills. She founded Dream Networks Social enterprise in 2015 to enable children to play a more active role in making a sustainable impact to reduce play inequalities through building play areas. Dream Networks collaborates with schools, businesses and communities to design and implement creatively sustainable playgrounds in disadvantage communities. Dream Networks has built playgrounds used by over 2500 children.
Marie is also an experienced chartered (CEng IMeche) mechanical engineer and product manager who has lead product development and implementation within a variety of technology sectors.
Founder of Funding Circle, a lending platform for SMEs who need quick and effective investment. The company has been a huge success story in the financial technology sector.
For over two decades Marion has been helping organisations to succeed by creating the conditions in which their people thrive and achieve extraordinary outcomes for customers, citizens and colleagues.
A Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Personnel Development and an accredited Executive Coach she has considerable expertise in human resource management, leadership, organisational design and change, and adult learning and development.
Marion has previously held executive HR director roles in local government, higher education and the police, as well as working as a consultant and coach in a range of different public service and commercial organisations.
Former successful secondary Headteacher including Gable Hall School and experienced MAT Trustee.
Philippa Cordingley, Chief Executive of CUREE is a renowned expert in evaluation, research use and effective Continuing Professional Development and Learning (CPDL). Philippa leads the CUREE research team.
Recent projects include exploration of what is involved the gaining sustainable momentum in school improvement for Teach First and a review of subject specific CPD in the UK and in comparison with High Performing Countries.
She also leads CUREE’s signature research service for evaluating the learning environment for teachers and learners in schools and for developing momentum in school improvement, SKEIN. She is Chair of the Foundation for Leadership in Education’s Research Group and a member of OECD’s Expert Group for Country reviews of teacher preparation and development.
Hashi Mohamed is a barrister at No5 Chambers and a Broadcaster at the BBC. In 2010, he joined The Honourable Society of Lincoln’s Inn and completed his pupillage training at 39 Essex Street Chambers in 2012.
Hashi practices in No5 Chambers in public law and commercial litigation related cases, though his main area of focus is Planning & Environmental law. He has been consistently listed as one of the highest rated planning barristers in England & Wales under the age of 35 in the Planning Magazine’s annual Planning Legal Survey.
He presents documentaries on BBC Radio 4, most recently on access to the top professions, child refugees making perilous journeys in the Mediterranean and terrorism and how nations react. Hashi writes regularly in various newspaper publications, including The Times, The Guardian and Prospect Magazine.
Ernest Boadu is a fraud strategy product manager at Chase UK, the digital bank recently launched by J.P. Morgan Chase, helping to build controls and processes to protect both its customers and the bank.
Prior to J.P. Morgan, Ernest worked as a management consultant with premier consulting firms including Deloitte and Ernst & Young across several projects, implementing streamlined operations for major clients through the restructuring and engineering of their internal systems and processes.
Ernest’s passion for education stems from his desire to raise the aspirations of students, particularly those from minority backgrounds. This has seen him volunteer with a couple of primary and secondary schools in London.
Similarly, his passion for capacity building sees Ernest serve his local community as a pastor with great emphasis on leadership development and wealth creation.
Big Education Trust is a company limited by guarantee registered in England and Wales.
Company registration number: 07648389.
VAT number: GB142676505
Registered Office: c/o School 21, Pitchford Street, London E15 4RZ
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