Welcome to Kent TV's coverage of the Kent Headteachers Conference

PAUL CARTER

Leader, Kent County Council

Paul Carter became Leader of Kent County Council in October 2005. From his election to the County Council in 1997 until he assumed the leadership, Paul held responsibility for the Education portfolio overseeing the education of 240,000 children in 600 schools and a further 32,000 3 & 4 year olds in early years. He was and remains especially committed to transforming education and oversaw the introduction of an exciting 14-16 vocational education programme in Kent. He has also fought hard to retain special schools to ensure that children with Special Educational Needs are given the support and help they need to reach their full potential. Paul believes passionately that public services should at all times put the customer (residents) first, be as bureaucratic free as possible, delivering quality and excellent value for money.

In September 2008, Paul was elected Chairman of the South East England Regional Assembly (SEERA) which has since been replaced with a new organisation, South East England Councils (SEEC), set up to champion quality of life in the South East.

SEEC represents all 74 Councils in the region and Paul has been elected as it’s first Chairman.
SEEC will work closely with the South East England Development Agency (SEEDA) to deliver a new Single Regional Strategy.

Outside local government, Paul still runs a number of land based businesses in property, construction and retail businesses in central London. Historically developing large residential developments Paul was a founding partner of Gander PLC the first property company on AIM (Alternative Investment Market). His retail businesses have all been construction related; builders’ merchants, architectural ironmongery and decorators’ merchants. Paul is married with three grown up children. He regularly competes in many aspects of motor sport, particularly in pre-war sports car racing, rallying and trialing.

CHARLES LEADBEATER

Author & Keynote Speaker

Charles Leadbeater is a leading authority on innovation and strategy, and is one of the most influential creative people in the world. He has advised companies, cities and governments, and is former Prime Minister Tony Blair's favourite corporate thinker.

We-think, his latest book, charts the rise of mass, participative approaches to innovation. It is one of several acclaimed books; Living on Thin Air, a guide to living and working in the new economy; Up the Down Escalator, an attack on the culture of public pessimism accompanying globalisation and In Search of Work which was one of the first books to predict the rise of more flexible and networked forms of employment. He has also written extensively and influentially on the case for more personalised, participative approaches to education, most recently a report entitled What’s Next? 21 Ideas for 21st Century Education.

In 2002 he was listed by GQ magazine as one of the Most Powerful Men in the UK. The New York Times anointed Charlie’s idea, The Pro-Am Revolution, as one of the biggest global ideas of 2004. In 2005 Charlie was ranked by Accenture, the global management consultancy, as one of the 30 top management thinkers in the world. In 2007 the Financial Times ranked him the outstanding innovation expert in the UK, and in 2008, the Spectator Magazine described him as "the wizard of the web".

He spent ten years working for the Financial Times where he was Labour Editor, covering industrial relations and training; Industrial Editor, and Tokyo Bureau Chief, before becoming Features Editor.

Charlie has worked as a senior adviser to several governments on the rise of the knowledge driven economy, the Internet, and on future strategies for more networked and personalised approaches to learning and education. The UK Government has turned to him for advice on policy issues ranging from health and education to climate change and culture. He was one of the first Europeans to advise the Chinese government.

Charlie has advised the European Commission, working as a special adviser on Competitiveness and the New Economy. In the run up to the EU’s Lisbon summit in 2000, he wrote the draft report presented at the Lisbon summit: “The New Economy: The European Model.”

As a Senior Associate with the influential London think tank Demos, Charlie leads the Atlas of Ideas programme which is exploring the international dynamics of innovation. The Atlas programme has produced reports on India, China, South Korea, Brazil and the Islamic world.

He has advised a long list of organisations on innovation strategy, including the BBC, Vodafone, Microsoft, Cisco and Accenture. He is a regular speaker at major corporate and governmental conferences: recent engagements include Tetra Pak, Google, Linklaters and Barclays.

Charlie is a Visiting Fellow at Oxford University's Said Business School and a founder of Participle, the leading public services innovation agency, which is working with public sector agencies to create next generation public services.

PENNY NICHOLLS

Director for Children and Young People, The Children’s Society

Penny Nicholls started her career in radiography and nursing, becoming Deputy Officer in charge of the Mother and Baby Unit in Leeds, where she spent ten years gaining extensive experience of care proceedings and wardship.

In 1991 she joined The Children’s Society as Manager of the Leeds Safe House, a refuge for children and young people under the age of 16 who run away or are forced to leave home or care and who are vulnerable and at risk on the street. The Safe House was one of several projects highlighted in The Children’s Society’s research on young runaways and informed the Society’s work with children abused through prostitution.

In 1997 Penny became Regional Social Work Manager with responsibility for the Safe on the Streets Programme, leading work with young runaways and young people abused through prostitution. In July 2001, Penny became the Director for Children and Young People, and in June 2004 became Strategy Director based at The Children’s Society’s Headquarters in London. Following restructuring in 2007, Penny resumed the role of Director for Children and Young People in March 2007.

SARAH HOHLER

Cabinet Member for Children, Families & Education, KCC

Sarah Hohler is the current Cabinet Member for Children, Families and Education at Kent County Council. An Oxford graduate, Sarah worked for Pergamon Press for two years (sales and acquisition), for Oxford University Press in Hong Kong (editing educational books) and Macmillan Education. She then went to New York with her diplomat husband and worked for an International Play Group in order to raise funds for a Young Artists exhibition.

She has founded a nursery school and worked as a school librarian at Spence School for two years. She then worked for the British Council, as an English Language Assistant in Brussels, supporting teachers, before returning to Kent.

She joined Kent County Council as an elected member in 1989 and was appointed Cabinet Member for Strategic Planning in 1997. She later became Cabinet Member for Communities and Deputy Leader to the late Lord Bruce-Lockhart. She stood down from the Cabinet when he retired as Leader in October 2004.

In June 2009, she became the sole Cabinet Member for Children, Families and Education at Kent County Council. In this role, she hopes to champion our young people and to support the excellent teachers who educate them and also to involve parents as fully as possible in the development of their children’s potential. She looks forward to working with you to achieve this ambition.

Mrs Hohler has four daughters and six grandchildren, educated in state and private schools both in this country and overseas.

ALAN BARHAM

Chair of Secondary Forum

Alan is in his19th year of Headship. He is Head of one of the most challenging schools in Kent. One of the highest levels of deprivation in Kent. 60% are Special Needs and over 40% of students are from non-conventional family units.

The College is acknowledged as one of the lead schools in the country for Extended School services, personalised learning programmes and Student Voice.

Alan is Chair of the Kent Secondary Heads Forum, Swale 14-24 Planning Forum, Board member for Swale Children’s Service Partnership (Children’s Trust) and a member of other KCC working parties and Think Tanks.

College numbers have grown from 800 to 1300 and the College is now oversubscribed. It is one of the first schools in the county to set up a joint Post-16 Centre for 6th formers and adult learners and specialises in vocational courses.

The College has offered internal apprenticeships for over 10 years and now employs over 20 ex-students, ranging from teachers, IT specialists, teacher assistants to admin staff. On average, 10+ Post 16 students are employed part-time and most Post 16 students work voluntarily in the College as mentors.

Over the last 7 years, the College has trained over 40 teachers to QTS. The College is a pioneer in the case of alternative and private providers for learning programmes in Key Stage 4.

The College has attracted over £6m in grants for innovations, including the running of the Swale Skills Centre, located on an industrial estate, providing training in Engineering and Construction services for schools at Key Stage 4, Post, Training Providers and Apprenticeships and for local businesses.

Prior to Headship, Alan was a Deputy Headteacher in two schools, a Local Authority Advisor, Head of 6th Form and Head of Geography Department. Before entering the teaching profession, he worked in the transport, retailing and banking industry.

He is a Headteacher dreading the thought of approaching retirement, as he enjoys his role so much and thinks the next 10 years are the most exciting time for the reform and success of the role of schools in meeting the needs of society.

PETER GILROY

Chief Executive, Kent County Council

Peter is the Chief Executive of Kent County Council and his career has taken him into the public and private sector in the UK and USA. He has worked in Health and Social Care and was Strategic Director of Social Services in Kent before becoming Chief Executive. During his eight years as Strategic Director of Social Services he took the largest Social Services department in the country from ‘poor’ performance to ‘excellent’. He led nationally for ten years on asylum matters for the Association of Directors of Social Services (ADSS), and chaired the National Taskforce. He took a leading role on issues related to Drugs and Alcohol and Child Protection. His involvement with child protection began in the1970s and he chaired the Kent Child Protection Committee for thirteen years. He also initiated a successful exchange programme with the US. He chairs Improvement and Efficiency South East and has a national reputation for innovation.

Peter is a member of the Advisory Boards for the World Health Care Congress and Managing Long Term Conditions; chairs the Kent Film and Television Board and is an associate member of the County Executives of America and a member of the Society of Industry Leaders. He launched the broadband channel, KentTV.com and took the lead with the Health Service in Kent in commissioning what is now Europe’s largest telehealth pilot – now involving a thousand people. He has also been a member of the Health Innovation Council set up by Lord Darzi. Peter has a number of external interests as well, including film and music.

PETER RUBERY

Headteacher, Fallibroome High School & Keynote Speaker

Peter Rubery is Head of Fallibroome High School, an 11-19, 1500 student Specialist Performing Arts College in Macclesfield, Cheshire. The school is the lead school for a Networked Learning Community and Leading Edge Partnership and in 2008 became a Training School. It was described by Ofsted in 2006 as ‘outstanding’, achieving the rare feat of a full set of grade 1 judgements. Peter was previously Head of Ercall Wood Technology College in Telford which is also a Leading Edge and Phase III Specialist School.

Peter has worked as an advisory teacher for TVEI and was seconded as Unilever Fellow to the London Leadership Centre at the University of London in 2001. He has established extensive links with schools in Australia, Europe and South Africa.
Peter has published several articles on emotional intelligence, he is a Research Associate of the National College for School Leadership, a Consultant Head for the Specialist Schools’ Trust and a National Leader of Education. He is frequently invited to speak at Headteacher conferences and school PD days and is currently leading groundbreaking work in Macclesfield centred on Co-operative Group-work Strategies. He is chair of the organising committee for the Learning Brain Europe conference that was successfully launched at Old Trafford, in 2005. It has since expanded to venues in Harrogate and Oxford in 2007 and returned to Manchester for two days in May 2009.