LJMU featured alumni

After completing my PGCE Primary (Special Educational Needs and Disabilities) with QTS at Liverpool John Moores University, graduating with Distinction, I secured a teaching role within the same specialist setting where I had previously worked as a Teaching Assistant. This progression allowed me to build on my practical experience while developing my professional identity as a SEND practitioner.

During my Early Career Teacher (ECT) years, I continued my academic journey by undertaking an MA in Education Practice at LJMU, achieving an overall Distinction. This enabled me to deepen my knowledge of SEND, policy, and pedagogy. My dissertation, titled "An Investigation into Educators' Attitudes and Challenges in Teaching Learners with Profound Multiple Learning Difficulties (PMLD) within a Severe Learning Difficulties (SLD) Setting," reflected my passion for inclusive education and contributed to my growing interest in practitioner research.

I am currently studying for a Doctor of Education (EdD) at LJMU. This has allowed me to further explore my professional identity and critically engage with the wider systemic and policy related challenges within education. Following my recent diagnosis of Autism at the age of 30, my research interests have developed to focus on neurodiverse educators, specifically examining how neurodivergent traits influence professional practice when implementing Education, Health and Care (EHC) Plans.

In my current role as a SEND teacher, I am responsible for a class of eight learners with complex and severe learning difficulties. I am committed to ensuring that teaching and learning is highly individualised, adaptive, and inclusive, enabling all pupils to make meaningful progress towards their EHC Plan outcomes. A key aspect of my practice involves the use of adaptive communication strategies to ensure every learner can express their voice. Alongside my classroom role, I am also part of the Positive Behaviour Support Team and serve as a Staff Wellbeing Lead, reflecting my commitment to both pupil and staff support.

Looking ahead, my aspiration is to contribute to higher education, particularly through working with LJMU as a lecturer. I am passionate about SEND and inclusive practice, and I hope to use my academic and professional experience to support and inspire the next generation of educators.

I graduated from Liverpool John Moores University in 1998 after completing a four-year BSc (Hons) in Science with Education and Qualified Teacher Status. I’m now in my 29th year in education, and the career that began at LJMU has taken me from the primary classroom to school and system leadership, national education programmes, authorship, podcasting and working with schools across the UK and internationally.

I began my career teaching in a primary school in Leicestershire and, after just two years, became a Lead Teacher of Mathematics for the local authority, supporting teachers across the county. In my fifth year of teaching, I became a local authority consultant for the National Numeracy Strategy, working with teachers and leadership teams to develop mathematics teaching and raise standards across the county.

I later returned to school, progressing through Assistant Headship and Deputy Headship, while continuing to work across schools. I became the first teacher in my local authority to work as a Lead Teacher across both English and Mathematics and also supported schools regionally with assessment and science.

One of the most significant stages of my career came when I established, with a colleague, one of the UK’s first all-female co-headships. Together, we demonstrated that senior leadership could be structured differently and helped to challenge some of the traditional assumptions about how school leadership had to look. Flexible working has remained an important strand of my work ever since.

Alongside school leadership, I chaired the teacher CPD committee for a teaching school alliance of more than 50 schools and served on the University of Leicester’s PGCE advisory board.

I subsequently moved into a part-time multi-academy trust role, where I developed and delivered professional development, mentored headteachers and provided school improvement support. I also created and led a regional early career development programme that ran for almost 12 years.

During this period, I wrote my first bestselling education book, Be More Toddler. The book explored doing leadership differently and drew on my experiences of co-headship and flexible working, as well as balancing headship with having three children in five years.

I later led the Department for Education’s first Flexible Working Ambassador Schools programme across the East Midlands and Humber, supporting the development of flexible working across the education sector. This work was based on my second book, Let’s Talk About Flex, which focused specifically on developing flexible working in schools.

My next move took me into a Deputy Director of Education role in the West Midlands, supporting 18 primary schools through school improvement, staff development and leadership support.

Today, I run my own education consultancy and work nationally and internationally with schools, trusts and education organisations. I provide training and support in cognitive science, curriculum design, research-informed practice, leadership and school improvement, and regularly deliver keynote speeches, full-day INSET and bespoke school support.

I have now written six bestselling books on education, with my seventh due to be published by the end of 2026. I also co-host the Mind the Gap: Making Education Work Across the Globe podcast with Tom Sherrington, and regularly speak at education events in the UK and overseas.

I was delighted to be awarded Fellowship of the Chartered College of Teaching in 2019 and have since contributed to projects including its Rethinking Curriculum work. I am also Co-Chair of Governors at a local primary school, a member of the Department for Education’s flexible working advisory group and a guest lecturer for a number of SCITT and university initial teacher training providers.

Now in my 29th year in education, I still find enormous joy and interest in working alongside the youngest children in our education system and the many wonderful colleagues who support them.

My four years at LJMU gave me far more than a degree and teaching qualification. They gave me the foundations for a career that, as a student, I could never have imagined. Graduating from LJMU gave me the keys to unlock a professional journey that has allowed me to work with and learn from thousands of children, teachers and school leaders over almost three decades.

Education has brought me over three decades of adventure, challenge, opportunity and enormous joy, and whenever my current work affords me the opportunity to return to Liverpool I do so with real gratitude and fondness.