Trustees
The Trust Board of Directors:
Rosemary Tong - Trustee
- Rosemary has worked in and with a wide range of schools in a variety of urban and rural areas. Her teaching experience has been mainly in 11 – 18 mixed secondary schools, but she has also worked with primary and special schools and has experience in sixth form colleges and three tier schools. She has extensive experience as a school inspector, appointed as senior county inspector for English in Essex in the early 1980s, secondary inspector for Hampshire in the 1990s and then Chief Inspector for Southampton. She was also an Ofsted inspector and a trainer for Ofsted.
- After working as Assistant Director for Children’s Services in Southampton, Rosemary has been an independent consultant to a range of schools. She has been a National Challenge Adviser, working with underperforming secondary schools, and a School Improvement Partner. Rosemary has been chair of governors for a sixth form college and is currently chair of governors in a Dorset VA school.
John Grinstead MBE - Trustee
- John served for 33 years in the British Army. His career took him to, among other places, Iraq, Kuwait, India and Zimbabwe. He spent his last 15 years in senior HR, logistic and infrastructure roles in Germany and the UK. During this time, he jointly chaired the Service Children’s Education Committee for British Forces Germany and led the Local Safeguarding Children’s Board in support of the Service community based throughout North West Europe. As Corps Colonel of the Royal Logistic Corps, he was responsible for the ethos, values and standards of the Corps and managed the distribution of benevolence to those in need. In 1996, John was awarded the MBE in recognition of his contribution to UK operational deployments overseas. Since leaving the Army in 2017, John has worked as Director of Operations for a Salisbury based charity before joining the Diocese of Salisbury Academy Trust in January 2021. John has been a member of the Children’s Panel in Scotland, protecting the safety and wellbeing of infants, children and young people, and a Trustee of several military charities.
Patrick Jarman - Vice Chair
- Patrick is an experienced Board executive with a broad business background covering strategic development, commercial, legal and HR matters and governance. He is currently an Executive Director of Teachers Building Society, a mutually owned provider of financial services to education professionals. He originally qualified as a solicitor and after six years working in private practice in the City switched to the aerospace industry where he held a number of senior commercial and legal roles over the following eighteen years. The last two of these roles were as General Counsel & Company Secretary of a stock exchange listed multi-national and Commercial Director of the UK arm of a major French Group. His responsibilities have included leading the development of commercial strategies, negotiating complex technology contracts and multi-national joint ventures and ensuring compliance with stock exchange rules and corporate governance expectations. In 2011, Patrick changed sectors and joined Teachers Building Society where, in addition to being a Board member, he is responsible for all legal matters, regulatory compliance, governance and risk management.
Mark Lacey - CEO
- Mark served as Headteacher in a large primary school in Bedminster, South Bristol. Mark led the school from a position of serious weaknesses to being a consistently good school with many outstanding elements. Key to the success of the school was the relentless focus on creating and maintaining an empowering vision for all members of the school community. Alongside this, development of people was key and the school developed its own programme of coaching for all staff as well as being recognised as a Gold Level Investor in People.
- Mark also led the development of the Malago Learning Partnership, a collaboration of 9 local schools in South Bristol. As Chair of the group he guided the development of a highly successful school improvement strategy, an in-depth joint practice development programme and a range of curriculum and assessment programmes. In 2012 he led his school through the academy conversion process. He also served for a number of years as a governor at a secondary school within the partnership. In addition to his work in school, Mark was very much involved in the development of the Local Leader of Education programme in Bristol through the National College, working in a coaching role with Headteachers to support them in the development and growth of leadership capacity; working with Headteachers to find solutions and ways forward within their own organisations.
- Since September 2015, Mark has served as Chief Executive of the Diocese of Salisbury Academy Trust.
- Mark has a Business Degree from the University of Bath as well as a Masters with distinction in Educational Leadership and Management from the University of Worcester, the latter of which focused on the effective features of collaborative partnerships between schools. Mark has four children of his own and is very active in the work of his local church.
Anne Millin - Trustee
- Anne is a retired local, regional and national school improvement consultant who worked operationally in classrooms to improve pedagogy and skills and also with school leaders providing both challenge and support. She worked collaboratively with groups of schools and also with and across local authorities. Most recently she delivered a Middle Leadership Development Programme across a large, two-campus academy in the Haberdashers’ Aske’s Federation. Following her audit, she wrote a bespoke programme to help address issues across both campuses.
- Anne was the National Strategies’ Programme Director for Primary School Improvement, she provided strategic leadership of the Improving Schools Programme across 9 regions and in 138 local authorities. For 2 years Anne worked as a Department for Education Adviser on the Academies and Free Schools Programme assessing the applications to open Free and interviewing successful proposers on their education and finance plans.
- Anne worked with the Salisbury Diocese Board of Education (SDBE) for 3 years, leading the Schools Causing Concern strategy to proactively reduce the numbers of schools at risk, reviewing progress in flagged schools and setting actions to help address issues. The quality and the impact of her work on school improvement has been acknowledged by HMI. Anne has significant expertise in the analysis of performance data to target proactive school improvement work and in improving accountability systems and school improvement processes within the diocesan MAT. Anne’s consultancy role with the DBE is ending as she steps into the role of DSAT director.
Giles Pugh - Trustee
- Giles Pugh FCA, BSc (Econ) is a chartered accountant who trained and qualified with Price Waterhouse after gaining a degree in accountancy. He is a highly experienced director of finance and has operated at director level for seventeen years.
- Prior to joining the Salisbury Diocese Board of Education as director of finance in 2013, he was a member of the senior management team and finance director at Kingston Maurward College of Further Education for seven years. He was responsible for financial modelling and plans for a successful studio school application. He has also been the director of finance at 3 NHS Trusts.
Siân Thornton - Trust Board Chair / Member
- Siân joined the DSAT board in 2022. Originally a Religious Education specialist, Siân has extensive teaching experience from early years to post-16, with 20 years headship in primary and middle schools including Church of England schools and schools with resourced SEND provision. Siân also has experience in DfE, LA and Diocesan advisory work and as an external adviser for headteachers’ performance management.
- Siân served as a senior Her Majesty’s Inspector in Ofsted’s SE region, involving inspection and monitoring in primary and secondary maintained schools and academies and independent schools, including SEND schools and alternative provision. Siân’s role also included Area SEND inspections, scrutiny of local authority school improvement services, and liaison with regional schools commissioners.
Lizzie Weavers - Trustee
- Lizzie Weavers serves as headteacher of a Salisbury Church of England primary school. She has been in this post for seven years and has led the school through an outstanding Ofsted and two excellent SIAMS. Lizzie is dedicated to the development of her school as a church school and in ensuring all pupils are given opportunities to experience ‘life in all its fullness’.
- Lizzie has completed her National Professional Qualification for Headship (NPQH) and has a Masters Degree in Education from the University of Winchester. Her studies focused on the development of teachers and building the capacity and effectiveness of leaders, an area Lizzie is very passionate about.
Tom Hitchings - Trustee
- Tom has recently retired from a long career in Industry, mainly in manufacturing. After a formative decade or so in the Oil & Gas sector, he joined a niche manufacturing company supplying equipment all over the world, and this role took him to work in many countries including Africa, China, Canada, USA and Egypt. He joined the Board of Directors of a specialist composites company in Somerset in 2002 working in the marine defence and aerospace sectors. He was then appointed as a founding Director of the National Composites Centre in Bristol, before moving on to a Business Development Director role helping a small business to grow in the aerospace market. Tom graduated in Mechanical Engineering in 1977. He is a retired Chartered Engineer and Fellow of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers.
- Outside of his career, Tom is currently Chair of Broad Chalke Parish Council, and Treasurer of Broad Chalke Community Land Trust enabling affordable housing for the local community.
Joy Tubbs - Trustee
- Joy’s teaching career spanned 18 years, leading to the senior leadership of a rural secondary comprehensive school of 1300 students. Joy became the first leading teacher within Suffolk LA, firstly modelling outstanding practice in her own classroom and subsequently supporting the development of pedagogy across the LA. Joy was promoted to the post of a LA Head of School Improvement, working particularly with schools causing concern; as a result of improved Ofsted and KS2 and KS4 outcomes across the LA, Joy joined the National Strategies as Deputy National Director School Improvement. Joy held responsibility for the development of the mathematics and English leading teacher programme, Improving Schools Programme (ISP) and SIP Programme. Joy was seconded to the DfE where she led a pilot project with 450 schools achieving significant accelerated improvement in children’s progress at KS2 and setting the foundations of school to school support and joint practice development across 30 LAs, and contributing to the 2010 White Paper.
- Joy was appointed as Director of the Salisbury Diocesan Board of Education in October 2014, serving the children, young people and head teachers of 194 church schools and academies and their parish communities. She has focused her role on creating a DBE centred on removing barriers to school improvement, supporting church school effectiveness and distinctiveness and creating a culture in which collaboration can thrive within an academy trust landscape. Joy was invited to join the Regional Schools Commissioners Headteacher Board in September 2015.
David Pain - Member
- David Pain joined the Diocese as Diocesan Secretary and CEO of the Board of Finance in January 2019. He lives in Winchester and is a member of St Paul’s Church. Before joining the diocese, he worked for the international development charity Christian Aid, as Head of the Africa programme and latterly as Director of Supporter Partnerships, responsible for fundraising and communications, campaigns and church engagement.
- Before working for Christian Aid he was Training Manager at the Selly Oak colleges and worked with the Diocese of Worcester Board for Mission. His international background includes working with the South African Council of Churches as a youth worker. David has a lifelong interest in learning and social change, especially from a faith perspective. He has a PGCE in Adult Religious Education and holds degrees in History, an MA in Political Theology and an MBA from the Open University.
- David served as a school governor for Western Primary in Winchester for 9 years, initially as Foundation Governor and then co-opted as Vice Chair.
The Right Reverend Karen Gorham - Member
- Bishop Karen holds a BA from the University of Bristol and trained for the ministry at Trinity College, Bristol. Prior to ordination she worked as an administrator with BTEC and the Royal Society of Arts and as a Pastoral Assistant in Essex and Hull.
- She served her title at Northallerton with Kirby Sigston in the Diocese of York from 1995 to 1999. She was ordained priest in 1996 and in 1999 went on to become Priest-in-Charge of St Paul’s, Maidstone in the Diocese of Canterbury. During this time, she was also Assistant Director of Ordinands and Area Dean of Maidstone. In 2006 she became an Honorary Canon of Canterbury Cathedral.
- Bishop Karen worked as a parish priest in Yorkshire and Kent, before taking up progressively more senior central Church posts in Kent and Buckinghamshire. She was Archdeacon of Buckingham from 2007, a member of the Church of England General Synod for twelve years, and for the last two served as a member of the Panel of Chairs.
- Bishop Karen was consecrated as the 36th Bishop of Sherborne in March 2016, working in the Diocese of Salisbury with responsibility mainly for parishes in Dorset. She is expert in managing complex organisational arrangements and directing the work of groups and individuals, including chairing a number of operational and governance-related groups.
The Ven. Antony MacRow-Wood - Member
- Antony has been the Archdeacon of Dorset since Summer 2015 and was the Parish Priest at St George’s in Oakdale, Poole for 11 years prior to this. He was brought up in Salisbury and attended Bishop Wordsworth’s School in the city. His entire ministry has been spent in Wiltshire and Dorset, having served his curacy in Swindon in the 1990s before moving to an eight-year incumbency just outside Weymouth and then to Oakdale in 2004.
- Antony is a Chartered Accountant and has served on the Salisbury Diocesan Board of Finance and Bishop’s Council. In 2011 he was elected chair of the Diocesan House of Clergy.
- Outside of the Church he has a long-standing involvement in the credit union movement. He was previously President of the Association of British Credit Unions, and is regarded nationally as an expert on credit unions. He was a key player in setting up the Churches’ Mutual Credit Union, of which he is now President.
- Antony has experience as a school governor serving as a governor (and Vice-Chair of governors) at a Secondary School in Poole for many years. He is currently Chair of the Salisbury Diocesan Board of Education.
Katie Fitzsimmons - Member
- Katie Fitzsimmons joined the Salisbury Diocese Board of Education (SDBE) as CEO and Diocesan Director Education in September 2023.
- The SDBE is a registered charity whose purpose is to serve and support our Church of England schools across the diocese, to support the teaching of RE and the delivery of collective worship, and to enable the flourishing of pupils and students.
- Katie has a background in education, training as a teacher of modern languages before moving into school leadership and then into school improvement support. She is an experienced school leader having worked in schools in Kent, Cornwall and London, as well as supporting schools across Worcestershire whilst working for Babcock. Katie has also worked in schools across the south of England in her role supporting Voice 21, a charity committed to developing oracy teaching and increasing oracy skills in children and young people.
- Katie joined the Church of England as Director for Schools and then Diocesan Director of Education in the Diocese of Truro, pioneering work in the changing educational landscape and supporting their diocesan vision to develop stronger links between schools and parishes. She supported this in her role as Growing Faith Champion and connected diocesan working to its impact on young people, notably through child focused diocesan synods.
- As well as her role in the Salisbury Diocese Board of Education, Katie is chair of the Association of Anglican Directors of Education, representing Diocesan Boards of Education across the country, and represents DDEs on the national Net Zero Carbon Schools Board.