Our Board of Advisors
Dame Alison Peacock
Professor Dame Alison Peacock is Chief Executive of the Chartered College of Teaching, a new Professional Body that seeks to raise our status through celebrating, supporting and connecting teachers to provide expert teaching and leadership. Prior to joining the Chartered College, Dame Alison was Executive Headteacher of The Wroxham School in Hertfordshire. Her career to date has spanned primary, secondary and advisory roles. She is an Honorary Fellow of Queens' College Cambridge, member of the Royal Society's Education Committee, and a Visiting Professor of both the University of Hertfordshire and Glyndŵr University. Her research is published in a series of books about Learning without Limits offering an alternative approach to inclusive school improvement.
Professor Becky Francis
Professor Becky Francis is taking time away from her role as Chief Executive Officer of the Education Endowment Foundation to Chair the UK Government's independent Review of Curriculum and Assessment. She was previously Director of the UCL Institute of Education (IOE), which is ranked #1 in the world for education in the international QS rankings. Her prior roles include Professor of Education and Social Justice at King’s College London, Director of Education at the RSA and Standing Advisor to the Parliamentary Education Select Committee.
Throughout her career, Becky has sought to maximise the impact of academic research by working closely with teachers and policy-makers. Becky has been a judge for the National Pupil Premium Awards and the TES Teacher of the Year awards. She has spearheaded high-profile research programmes assessing the impact of major reforms in the English school system on educational inequalities.
Becky’s academic expertise and extensive publications centre on social identities and inequalities in educational contexts. She is best known for her body of research on social identities and educational attainment, including gender, race and social class.
Caroline Rowley
Caroline Rowley works in Corporate Philanthropy at Bloomberg LP overseeing philanthropic initiatives in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Caroline has worked in education for over 20 years with a particular focus on tackling educational inequality in the UK. She started her career as an apprentice at an FE College delivering online learning and later moved to the University of Lincoln managing recruitment and widening participation initiatives. Caroline also joined the Ark Schools network supporting the development of extended schools provision before moving to Business in the Community to help develop and scale their flagship education campaign. Caroline sits on the HeadStart Advisory board.
Emma Dickinson
Emma Dickinson is a Principal Policy Officer on the Employment and Skills Team at Liverpool City Region Combined Authority.
Emma works with the 6 local authorities to support improved outcomes for children and young people. This includes supporting recruitment and retention, through a whole system approach, in the Early Years Education Sector and working alongside colleagues on the City Region Long Term Skills Plan. She leads the collective impact place-based change programme, Cradle to Career on behalf of LCRCA and has worked with Liverpool John Moores University to establish the Centre for Educational Leadership providing representation on the Advisory Board.
Previously, Emma has over 20 years' experience in education, holding a number of senior leadership positions in secondary schools. She has also worked for senior national politicians, advising and supporting work on a variety of issues including Education and Health and Wellbeing.
Esther Bird
Esther is an #iwill Ambassador and an Alumni Ambassador for the Fair Education Alliance after serving on the Youth Steering Group for two years.
She is passionate that all young people should be given a platform to share their opinions and make change. She has been a climate activist for the last 7 years, working with other young people both in her local town and around the world to improve conservation and the environment.
She also loves dancing, music, football and chess as well as festivals and spending time in nature.
Jason Arther
Jason is CEO of Mission 44. After starting his career as a teacher in East London, he has held leadership roles in the non-profit sector, including at Teach First, the #iwill campaign and Youth Futures Foundation. Jason also served as a senior local councillor in London. He holds a BA in Politics, Philosophy and Economics from the University of Oxford and a Masters in Education from the University of Cambridge.
Jessica Kerslake
Jessica is Pensions Partner at A&O Shearman and has over 18 years’ experience advising the trustees and sponsors of some of the largest UK pension funds on every aspect of UK pension provision.
She also advises several large UK companies on their pension strategy and on transactions where there is a pension scheme in scope. Jessica has significant experience advising on member and adviser disputes, governance and regulation (including the UK pensions regulator’s powers), large scale rectification exercises, transactions, liability management, benefit designs and risk transfer. Jessica sits on the Legal Panel for the Pensions and Lifetime Savings Association and regularly advises on policy and regulation. Jessica also has a particular specialism in pensions tax law and she provides annual pensions tax training through the Association of Pensions Lawyers.
Jon Whitehouse
Jon joined Barclays in 2009, as Head of Public Policy, UK Banking. The following year he took on the wider role of Public Affairs Director, with responsibility for public affairs and government relations for Barclays Group. Jon is currently Managing Director, Government Relations and Chief of Staff to the Chairman. Previously Jon worked for 11 years in Public Affairs at Lloyds TSB, which merged with HBOS to form Lloyds Banking Group in January 2009. Prior to working for Lloyds TSB, Jon was parliamentary researcher to the Rt. Hon. Bruce George MP, a member of the UK Parliament. And Chairman of the Defence Select Committee. He read British Politics and Legislative Studies at the University of Hull, East Yorkshire.
Moira Sinclair
Moira joined Paul Hamlyn Foundation in February 2015 from Arts Council England where she was Executive Director for London and the South East.
Moira is Chair of Clore Leadership, Chair of the London Mayor’s Cultural Strategy Board and from March 2024, Chair of Factory International. She is also a member of the British Library Advisory Council and of the Investment Committee for the Arts & Culture Impact Fund. She is a Visiting Leadership Fellow at Exeter University Centre for Leadership.
Previously, she was Executive Director at Arts Council England and Director of Vital Arts, an arts and health charity. She has also worked in local government, and in theatre and production management. A graduate of Manchester University where she studied drama, Moira became a Clore Fellow in 2004/05.
Nizam Uddin
Nizam is Chief Strategy Officer of Algbra, a technology-based financial ecosystem dedicated to global financial inclusion by focusing on the underserved and underbanked. Nizam was previously the Senior Head of Mosaic and Community Integration at The Prince’s Trust, where he oversaw the organisation's community cohesion and social integration activities and led Mosaic, an independent Initiative founded by HRH The Prince of Wales to uplift diverse communities across the UK's highest areas of deprivation.
Nizam has a strong interest and background in overcoming the societal and economic challenges that prevent disenfranchised and minority communities from fulfilling their potential. He is a 2019 Greenberg World Fellow at Yale University and a 2019 US State Department International Visitor Leadership Programme (IVLP) participant. Nizam was awarded an OBE in the Queen’s 2020 Birthday Honours list for services to social mobility and community integration.
Oghale Erikigho
Oghale is an Alumni Ambassador for the Fair Education Alliance after serving two years on their Youth Steering Group. She is also a Volunteer Coach at Universify Education and a Target Oxbridge Mentor, who aims to decrease educational inequality and support students who face disadvantage due to their background.
Oghale is 21 years old and has recently graduated from the University of Oxford reading Psychology and Philosophy. Living in an area of South London with limited access to higher education, Oghale developed a passion for increasing attainment and widening participation. She took advantage of many initiatives that offered support on her Oxford journey, and now frequently volunteers to give back to the academic community.
Rowena Hackwood
Rowena is now in her seventh year as the CEO of a large MAT, first at the David Ross Education Trust and now at Astrea Academy Trust. With a professional background as a management consultant, she previously held leadership roles in the private sector, higher education, local government, and charities, including running a £60m philanthropic regeneration project in the north-east (the Auckland Project).
Successes at Astrea include the improvement in primary schools’ Ofsted ratings from 63% to 95% of the Trust’s schools being deemed Good, and Phonics hitting national average in 2023 for the first time. Rowena will be speaking about her recent MAT Summary Evaluation experience, in which Astrea was described as at a Trust that had moved from a ‘model of autonomy to one of collaboration and a rigorous drive towards excellence’.
Rowena is a passionate advocate of building coherence, collaboration and capacity within a sector that can sometimes tend towards competition; she is a mentor to a number of CEOs, provides support and advice to a range of sector groups, and is Vice Chair of the Queen St Group, with a particular interest in supporting the development of the next tranche of female MAT CEOs.
Steve Taylor
Steve Taylor is CEO of Cabot Learning Federation (CLF), a Multi-Academy Trust of now over 35 entities, serving the educational needs of 18,000 children and young people aged 2 to 19. Since its inception in 2009 the CLF has grown to serve children across Bristol, South Gloucestershire, North Somerset, Somerset, and Gloucestershire employing over 3,000 people in a range of roles designed to help children to be successful in their lives. The CLF is a founding partner of the Five Counties Teaching School Hubs Alliance and, via its CLF Institute, runs the CLF SCITT (soon to be Five Counties SCITT), as well as the Boolean Maths Hub, two Behaviour Hubs, and an Attendance Hub. Steve Taylor became a teacher of MFL in 1995. He took up his first headship in August 2001 in Leiden in the Netherlands, and his second in Bristol in 2009.
Steve and his colleagues at CLF participate actively in a range of local, regional and national networks that are designed to support the broader development of the education sector for the benefit of all children. Steve is currently Chair of the Board of The Queen Street Group, an organisation of 43 multi-academy trusts and holds governance roles for two separate MATS. In 2015 he was appointed as a National Leader in Education. He is a Fellow of the Chartered College of Teaching, and a trained Lead Inspector for Ofsted.
Dame Sue John
Dame Sue was the headteacher of Lampton School in Hounslow from 1997 to 2015, transforming it into an outstanding school. The school was included in the 2010 Ofsted publication – Twelve outstanding secondary schools: excelling against the odds, and became one of the first designated Teaching Schools in the country.
Dame Sue worked as a National Leader of Education and as project manager for some of London’s most challenging and complex schools. Dame Sue was also the secondary director of the London Leadership Strategy for the London Challenge from 2007 until 2010 and was awarded a DBE for services to education in 2010. She was previously awarded an honorary fellowship from Brunel University for her services to teacher education and was recently awarded an Honorary Doctor of Laws by Roehampton University. Dame Sue has held directorships at the DFE, Future Leaders and Teaching Leaders and is currently a Director of Turner Schools Academy Trust.
Dame Sue is a member of the Sutton Trust Education Advisory Group and of the Royal Society’s education committee. She is currently involved with two major educational charities and is the Chair of the Brilliant Club Board of Trustees, a Teach First Innovation Partner. This is an award- winning charity that exists to increase the number of pupils from under represented backgrounds to progressing to highly selective universities.
Tom Duff Gordon
Tom Duff Gordon is Vice President of International Policy at Coinbase, where he drives the company’s engagement with policymakers in global markets across the UK, Europe, APAC, LatAm, and the MENA region.
Tom previously served as Managing Director at Credit Suisse, Head of Public Policy Europe and UK, where he had responsibility across all areas of regulatory policy and government affairs and chaired the internal global Credit Suisse policy committee, which coordinates positioning on international and cross-border issues. In that capacity, Tom’s areas of focus included EU and UK competitiveness post-Brexit, UK / Swiss trade deal, bank capital reforms, market access and secondary markets, ESG and FinTech. Tom has spoken at many of the key financial services regulatory policy conferences, and also supported Credit Suisse’s most prominent global client relationships with political and regulatory updates. He is on the Board of the International Regulatory Strategy Group (IRSG), the leading, cross-sectoral UK regulatory policy trade association, where he chaired one of the standing committees. For three years he co-chaired the main policy committee for the Association of Financial Markets in Europe (AFME). Tom holds an MA degree from the University of Oxford. He began his career as a consultant at Accenture.
Vik Verma
Vik Verma is the Director of Education at Bristol City Council. He is a highly experienced and passionate leader in children’s services, having transformed and led high-performing services in local government and education.
Vik has held significant roles in the public sector, including Director of Children’s Services in the London Borough of Newham, Director of Education in Dorset Council and senior roles in Westminster City Council. Prior to this, he was a member of the executive team at one of the largest academy trusts in the country, Lift Schools, for five years and has held several advisory roles with academy trusts and charities.
He has successfully established impactful place-based partnerships, bringing together political leaders, schools, and the NHS to drive positive change in communities. He has served as a Trustee of The Mix since 2021.