Education Improvement Team

After over 20 years working as a senior leader in education, I particularly enjoy working with leadership teams to help them identify the key priorities that will move their schools forward. Having been a National Leader of Education since 2009, I have had the opportunity of providing improvement support to a wide range of schools, and of coaching and mentoring many leaders. I am proud to say that in my time as a headteacher, 6 members of my senior team went on to become heads themselves and I am particularly keen to encourage women into senior leadership roles.

I believe it is vital to consider the context of any organisation before starting to suggest strategies and I am also very aware that ‘one size does not fit all’ when it comes to school improvement.

My training as an Ofsted Inspector has sharpened my understanding of the inspection process – something that has been very useful to SET schools going through the process, both primary and secondary. I have the privilege of leading the SET Leaders of Education team, a group of highly skilled staff who are able to provide specialist expertise as well as a very high level of pedagogical input.

I taught Business and Economics at a number of schools in Hertfordshire before being appointed deputy headteacher at Sir John Lawes School in 2007. I was appointed Headteacher of Francis Bacon School in 2011 and led its transformation into Samuel Ryder Academy, Hertforshire's first all-through school.

As Deputy CEO, I now support other schools in the Trust, mentoring newly appointed headteachers and providing leadership and strategic guidance, particularly over data and curriculum.  I am a board member of the Alban Teaching School Alliance, Governor and Chair of the Resources Committee at the local Pupil Referral Unit (PRU), as well as a member of the St Albans Strategic Partnership Executive Group.

I have been working at a senior level in education for more years than I care to mention, I have also had the privilege over my career of working in primary, secondary, all through and special schools so have a broad spectrum of experience of what life is like on the “frontline” in a number of settings.

I have extensive experience of school finance, estates, HR, admin, operations, IT, payroll, attendance and governance; as well as having been a DSL in a large secondary school with the additional responsibility for pastoral care at KS3 and KS4.

I believe I have the skills to be a sounding board and support for schools in a whole host of areas, am happy to roll my sleeves up and give practical help if needed, alongside the leadership support that is a key to success. I am very proud to manage the central team; a team of first-class experts in every sphere of school operational life who are there to support and advise our headteachers and schools. Our headteachers run their schools and are always complimentary on the support they receive from them; it gives them the time to concentrate on that “frontline”.

My passion lies with our students, their educational experience and well-being, it is why I have stayed in education all this time. I am also very keen to promote and support our support staff.

I am a Chemist and have been teaching for 26 years. I have extensive knowledge and understanding of both primary and secondary phases of the education and have been the Head of Inclusion, SENDCo, the DSL and in the past few years lead the primary phase of the Samuel Ryder Academy.

I also hold Post Graduate qualifications in Science, Special Educational Needs and Education studies and am a member of the British Psychological Society as a specialist assessor.

I will be working very closely with the Headteachers, SENDCos, Designated Senior Leads and Governors to ensure that the provision for all our learners is of the highest quality and that they receive the best quality of education, care and support.   

Yvonne Anderson began her teaching career at Sir John Lawes School in 2011, since then she has been given many opportunities to demonstrate her deep commitment to student success and effective teaching practices. Yvonne has created schemes of learning and assessments across all Key Stages and runs many successful intervention sessions, ensuring mathematics is accessible for all students.

Yvonne is extremely enthusiastic about the teaching and learning of mathematics and during her time at SJL she has found it rewarding to mentor trainee and newly qualified teachers at the beginning of their teaching careers. She now looks forward to sharing her expertise on a wider level with other schools within the Trust. Supporting them to help all students reach their potential in mathematics is her main motivation.

Lucy Caldicott is Assistant Head of Science at Sir John Lawes School where she has taught for almost seven years, starting as a Schools Direct trainee with the Alban Federation (now known as Alban TSH) in 2015. She is a chemistry specialist but has a background in neuroscience which has led to a deep interest in cognitive science and evidence-based education - especially in regards to pedagogy and curriculum development. Over the course of her time at SJL Lucy has led CPD sessions on many aspects of cognitive science, at a departmental level as well as whole school and trust wide, leading to a keen interest in teacher development and effective CPD. Lucy has recently completed the Chartered College of Teachers CTeach programme where she carried out research into the testing effect, retrieval and metacognition.

Erin Curnow is Deputy Headteacher at Harpenden Academy. Within this role she leads on Teaching and Learning, Behaviour, Computing and Science. Erin also sits on the SET working parties for teaching and learning, sustainability and new technologies. Erin has a Masters degree in Primary Education and has completed her National Professional Qualification for Senior Leaders (NPQSL). Recently, she became a qualified Apple Learning Coach.

Currently Erin teaches a Key Stage 2 class so is very much still ‘on the ground’. Therefore, she understands the importance of ensuring any new initiatives are driven from research, focus on driving school improvement and take into account staff workload. During her teaching career, Erin has worked in and with a wide range of schools, delivered CPD, created policies and implemented initiatives. These range from new behaviour policies to new subject area curriculums. Erin is very well-placed to advise and support the Primary phase of the Scholars Education Trust.

Katharine Hamilton has been teaching secondary English since 2000 and is lucky enough to have taught in a wide range of schools in the UK and abroad, including state, private, international and cross-phase schools. Katharine brings extensive classroom practice as well as middle leadership experience to the role of SET Leader of Education, having been a Head of Department and Head of Sixth Form in previous schools. Katharine is currently Literacy Coordinator and English teacher at Sir John Lawes School, where she has been very happily working since 2019. 

Katharine's priority in this role is to support our English departments to flourish and enable staff within them to be as reflective and effective as they can be, so that our students can reach their full potential. She really enjoys helping staff to share their passion for English with their students and sharing good practice across the SET schools.

Dr Elizabeth Mountstevens has been teaching Science at Sir John Lawes School for 10 years.  She is passionate about evidence-informed teaching and in 2019 was one of the first teachers in the country to be awarded Chartered Teacher status through the Chartered College of Teaching. Elizabeth works as an Evidence Lead in Education with Sandringham Research School, delivering training on metacognition, memory and feedback. She looks forward to sharing evidence-informed strategies with other schools across the trust.

Over the past 5 years at Sir John Lawes School Elizabeth has combined ideas from cognitive science with the spiral curriculum to develop a new teaching sequence for KS4 chemistry. She has carried out her own research into using metacognition to support KS5 students and presented her work on problem-solving in Science at the Association of Science Education national conference. Elizabeth has supported early career Chemistry students at other schools through a programme run by the Royal Society of Chemistry and looks forward to supporting other teachers across the trust schools.

Sophie Scott currently Head of Computing & Lead Practitioner in New Technologies, based at Sir John Lawes School. During her time at SJL she has taught on a variety of courses at Key Stage 4 and 5 and currently delivers the OCR GCSE and A Level in Computer Science. Sophie is also an Assessment Team Leader for the OCR GCSE in Computer Science, giving her additional insight into how to successfully prepare students for exams. She leads a successful department where students regularly achieve results significantly above the national average, and am well-placed to support the delivery of Computing across the Trust. She also has expertise in embedding new technologies into teaching and learning.

Kate Watson was part of the team who set up Harpenden Academy in 2012 so has extensive experience in setting up and embedding new systems and initiatives. Kate has been Maths, PSHE, Mental Health and Science lead during her time at Harpenden Academy and is currently the KS2 and English lead as well as being on the SLT. She has introduced and embedded many successful English initiatives for children and staff alike; she is passionate about bringing English learning alive through cross curricular links and first-hand experiences to ensure a love of reading and writing alongside excellent outcomes for all children.

Kate is equally passionate about staff development and wellbeing and has delivered and facilitated a wide variety of English and Mental Health CPD within the Trust. Kate is also an SLE within the Luton Teaching Alliance and has just completed her National Professional Qualification for Senior Leaders (NPQSL). Outside work, Kate loves spending time with her two daughters, reading, going to the theatre and outdoor swimming (whatever the weather!)