Supporting Pupil Personal Development - Speakers

Joanna Feast (Chair) Education Consultant, Clean Well-Being 

Joanna Feast is a teacher, trainer, writer and consultant with over 20 years’ experience in the field of health education, specialising in PSHE, well-being and mental health. She is the director of Clean Well-Being and teaches professional and personal development courses, effective exercise classes and retreats for people who value their well-being. 

Zarina Connolly, school improvement adviser and author of national Excellence in Pupil Development Award

Zarina is an independent education consultant with highly developed skills and knowledge of inspection, improvement and quality assurance practices in schools. She is the author of the Excellence in Pupil Development Award. Her vast experience of leading complex inspections, as Her Majesty’s Inspector, together with more than 15 years’ experience in senior leadership in secondary schools in London and the North West, has given her a deep knowledge and understanding of successful strategies to improve schools. Zarina was one of Ofsted’s national trainers and the regional lead for safeguarding. Previously, she was Vice Prinicipal at Rudheath Community High School which was awarded the accolade of one of the most improved schools by the DfE. 

Richard Eyre, Chief Programmes Officer, The Brilliant Club

Richard leads the Programmes Division, which encompasses The Brilliant Club’s two programmes for schools and its Research and Impact Department. Before joining The Brilliant Club, Richard worked as a public policy and strategy consultant, advising education system leaders in the UK and internationally. From 2014-2016 he worked in Washington DC as strategy director at the US Education Delivery Institute. A graduate of the Civil Service Fast Steam, Richard spent the first nine years of his career in the Department for Education and then the Home Office, serving in a range of high-profile policy and delivery roles spanning education, children’s policy and policing and security.

Kelly Hannaghan, Wellbeing Leader at Lessness Heath Primary School

Kelly is the wellbeing leader at Lessness Heath Primary School and has spent her professional career passionately focusing on enhancing the opportunities and life chances of pupils, staff and families in education. Through the power of her mental health training and therapeutic relationship skills, she has successfully led on the Wellbeing Award for Schools process, resulting in the school being the first nationally to achieve this. Kelly is a regular blogger and active writing of wellbeing in education and is passionate about creating the conditions under which teachers and pupils flourish.

Claire Kelly, Director of Curricula and Training, Mindfulness in Schools

After a 25-year teaching career, Claire joined the UK charity Mindfulness in Schools Project as their Director of Curricula and Training,  creating classroom content and training teachers in mindfulness-based programmes for youth settings. Claire is a consultant member for the All Party Parliamentary Group on Mindfulness, and contributed to the Mindful Nation Report UK report.

David Kerr, Consultant Director of Education, Young Citizens

David Kerr is Consultant Director of Education at the NGO Young Citizens (formerly the Citizenship Foundation) in London. David was Professional Officer to the Crick Group and seconded to Department for Education (DfE) and QCA in London in support of the citizenship education initiative in England. He has led major research studies in citizenship education at national, European and international level for Department for Education (DfE), IEA, OECD, European Commission (EC) and Council of Europe (CoE) including the Citizenship Education Longitudinal Study (CELS) and IEA CELS and ICCS10 studies. He is a citizenship and civic education expert for the Council of Europe. He is currently a Council Member of the Association for Citizenship Teaching (ACT) and joint editor of its journal Teaching Citizenship. He has written and published widely in the field of citizenship and human rights education.

Kate O'Connor, Head Teacher at Lessness Heath Primary School

Kate has taught and led schools in challenging circumstances throughout her career spanning a twenty-year period. She has led her current school out of special measures with a key focus on the value of relationship school cultures that look after and protect the wellbeing of the whole school community. Kate believes passionately in growing schools that are characterised by cultures of trust, agency collaboration and happiness. She is an active speaker sharing strategies of the importance of creating a positive culture within education.

Krupa Patel, Assistant Headteacher, Shaftesbury High School

Krupa is an Assistant Headteacher at a SEND secondary school. She is passionate about leading through self-awareness. Krupa has been part of developing a dynamic curriculum which has stemmed from the concept of intrinsic motivation. Her work has led to an 83% decrease of behaviour incidents through the approach of wellbeing and students’ accountability. The school’s work was recently recognised by Ofsted as Outstanding.

Martin Rogers, Senior Researcher, Education and Employers

Martin leads the research team at the charity Education and Employers. He is responsible for evidence on the importance of employer engagement in education and training. His work has been published in the Annual Report of the Chief Medical Officer, the Local Government Chronicle and the Municipal Journal.

Sarah Soyei, Head of Strategy and Development, EqualiTeach

Sarah holds an MA in Equal Opportunities and Society (Distinction) and has been working in the field of equality for 14 years, delivering equality training to more than 7,000 people throughout the UK. She has overseen the development and delivery of educational programmes working with more than 300,000 people. These have included programmes of work commissioned by the government, EHRC, more than 20 local authorities and private sector organisations. Sarah has authored several publications in the field, including bespoke equality toolkits for organisations such as Home Group Housing Association and TeachFirst.

Lesley Tyler, Deputy Head, Benenden School

Lesley is an advanced skills teacher in gifted and talented education, delivering training on this topic for the county and for the Specialist Schools and Academies Trust where she was a lead practitioner in the education of able students. She also worked as a consultant on curriculum design and project-based learning for the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority and the National College of School Leadership, and designed and ran summer schools for gifted students. She ran a county-wide project for able students as part of the Independent and State School Partnership which involved 35 schools.