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Ros Luff is a parent, former school governor for SEN and describes herself as a SEND Advocate. Her youngest child is autistic and has experience of both mainstream and specialist schooling. Ros has been involved with parent carer forums for over ten years. She has seen the SEND system from SEND pathfinder, Children's & Families Act 2014, implementation and now informing on the SEND review.

Unity Schools Partnership is a family of secondary, primary and special schools located mainly in Suffolk, and also on the Essex and Cambridgeshire borders as well as Romford in East London.

Each school shares the same values and faces similar issues, while providing a close network of support and challenge. We recognise the unique characteristics of each of the communities we work in and how they are reflected in distinctive school cultures.

Unity is committed to a partnership that respects, sustains and supports. We encourage cultural diversity, celebrate the special qualities of each of our schools and recognise that communities must develop and grow to become sustainable.

The central belief of the Partnership is that every young life is special – open to possibility, gifted with the potential to change the world for the better. Our ambition is to unlock the potential of all children, remove the barriers to aspiration and ensure that all our children succeed.

Gary joined the EEF on secondment in September 2021. In his Content Specialist role, he aims to support schools to be evidence-informed in their practice for students with SEND. Alongside this, he leads on SEND provision for a Multi Academy Trust in London and Hertfordshire. He is a secondary Drama teacher and former SENDCO and Head of Year.

Gary authors the SENDMatters.co.uk blog and has recently written The Lone SENDCO, a handbook for SENDCOs.

Dr. Kulvarn Atwal completed his PGCE at the University of East London in 1999 and has worked in 4 East London schools. He began studying for his Masters in Education in his NQT year and has been a passionate advocate of teacher engagement in research. In 2016, Kulvarn completed his Professional Doctorate in Education, and his thesis investigated the factors that impact upon teacher engagement in professional learning activities. His conceptual framework included a model designed for school leaders to implement in schools to maximise teachers' formal and informal learning opportunities.

For the past nine years he has been Head Teacher at Highlands Primary School and is currently also Head Teacher at Uphall Primary School. In 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020 and 2021 Highlands was recognised by the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, as one of the highest performing primary schools in London for pupil progress. He has just published his first book, The Thinking School – Developing a Dynamic Learning Community. He tweets at @thinkingschool2.

Katherine Walsh is the Regional SEND Leader for South East with Whole School SEND and Co-Project Director for the Educational Endowment Foundation’s SEND Review Trial.

She is an experienced teacher and school leader, bringing fifteen years teaching experience and nine years as a senior leader to the role. Katherine has experience teaching in both primary and secondary schools as a class teacher, Qualified Teacher of the Deaf and Autism Resource Base Teacher. Katherine is also an experienced SENCO; she has led SEND provision in primary and secondary schools in England and America. Over the past ten years, Katherine has developed particular expertise in working with leadership teams to develop school-wide systems, establishing shared and inclusive visions for the education of children and young people with SEND.

Amelie Thompson has worked in education for over 20 years, including 12 years as a senior leader and headteacher. She now works at Greenshaw Learning Trust as Assistant Director of Education - SEND. She is also the regional lead with Whole School SEND for London region and lead author of the Teacher Handbook: SEND. Amelie has a keen interest in how we, as leaders, build systems and create environments that enable ‘every teacher to be a teacher of SEND’ – driven by leadership that builds inclusivity into all aspects of school practice. As a school leader, she challenges herself to consistently reflect on the operational implications and implementation of this strategic vision and is strongly committed to cross-phase and cross-sector collaboration to achieve this.

Dr Matt Silver is the CEO of Pathways Education, an education group that creates equitable communities that thrive from serving each other and our planet. Pathways runs re-engagement schools, hybrid college/social enterprises supporting learners with additional needs into employment. They also run a Development arm that consults and lectures internationally on a host of topics in leadership and SEND, whilst also coaching with Complete executive group. 

Dr Andrew Sutcliffe is a Chartered Educational Psychologist and an accredited Leadership Coach. Having started his career as a teaching assistant and learning disability care worker, Andrew now has more than 25 years of experience working in mainstream schools, day nurseries, 6th forms, specialist provisions, Sure Start centres, charities, social care teams, and school governing bodies.

Andrew currently works independently across North and East London, supporting mainstream schools and specialist provisions with individual inclusion, staff development and whole-school systems. Andrew’s practice is grounded in humanistic, inclusive, and person-centred principles, within the structures of consultation, coaching, supervision, and reflective practice.

Andrew’s special interests are gender diversity, neurodiversity, positive parenting, and emotionally aware leadership.

Alan Wood is Co-Founder and Director of Evidence for Learning. Evidence for Learning (EfL) has transformed how more than schools, colleges and provisions are able to evidence, assess, review and plan for meeting the unique needs of learners. It is an app which supports an inquiry-based approach to education and provision, allowing all stakeholders in a child's learning to quickly and easily gather photo and video evidence, linked to the individual’s learning goals. Observations can be annotated and tagged to reflect a school’s basket of indicators. EfL has also changed how parents/carers, external stakeholders and the learner themselves are engaged and empowered to be involved in the entire learning process and journey – a multi-agency approach. In 2018 EfL launched the LearningShared SEND community which brought together more than 80 specialist SEND leaders and practitioners across the UK. The community has since developed into a professional learning community comprising more than 2000 practitioners from that support learners with SEND.

Jessie is the Deputy Money editor at The Times and The Sunday Times. She is the author of Autism, How to Raise a Happy Autistic Child. Her eldest son is autistic and has recently moved from a mainstream primary to a special secondary school.

Emily Fraser is the Literacy and Phonics Lead and Reception Class Teacher at West Boldon Primary School, a mainstream primary in South Tyneside with a diverse catchment area.

Phil works at Shaw Education Trust as the National Director of Education: Specialist. He joined the trust from Ofsted where he was one of Her Majesty’s Inspectors. Phil had a regional lead responsibility for special educational needs and disability. Prior to working for Ofsted, Phil gained extensive senior management experience as a headteacher and executive headteacher of special schools, residential schools and colleges. He has worked as a local authority school improvement partner and as a leadership trainer for the National College. During his time as a National Leader of Education he led and managed a National Support School and Teaching School. He has a postgraduate qualification in special and inclusive education and has worked internationally to support school improvement.

Phil has significant experience in governance having been a school governor in primary, secondary and special schools, including roles as Chairperson and safeguarding lead. Phil regularly supports local authorities and clinical commissioning groups to improve their offer for children and young people with special educational needs. He is currently an independent chairperson to an improvement board in one of these areas in England.

Phil is a trustee of the national charity Equals which is committed to improving the lives of children and young people with learning difficulties and disabilities through supporting high quality education.

Jane Sharp began her career in education as a science teacher before training to become a Qualified Teacher for Vision Impairment. She has worked as a QTVI for 20 years, both in a secondary resource base and as a peripatetic teacher in mainstream schools. Assistive technology, with its potential to enable children and young people to become independent learners, is an area of special interest and she regularly delivers training on this topic for VI education organisations. 

Jane is currently chair of VIEW, the professional association for the vision impairment education workforce, whose aim is to support professionals to support the children and young people with VI that they work with.

Kelly Ashford has been Deputy Headteacher and Inclusion Lead at Wells Hall Primary in Great Cornard since September 2020. Prior to this, Kelly was Assistant Headteacher and Inclusion Manager at Laureate Community Primary School in Newmarket, where she led the effective implementation of the Maximising the Impact/Practice of Teaching Assistants (MITA/MPTA) project. Kelly is passionate about inclusion and believes that it is our moral responsibility to ensure that all pupils access a high-quality curriculum which is tailored to meet their needs.

Aimee Durning is currently Director of Inclusion and Community at The University of Cambridge Primary School. 

After several years of working as a parent volunteer, Aimee was employed as a Teaching Assistant in 2007. Aimee’s educational career blossomed when she joined the first University primary school in the country. During 2018, Aimee established the University of Cambridge Primary School’s Teaching Assistant Forum, which provides professional development sessions for Teaching Assistants in the local area. Aimee won Classroom Assistant of the Year 2019 at the annual TES Awards and was awarded an MBE in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List 2021 for her work with Teaching Assistants, Reading for Pleasure and children with Special Educational Needs. Aimee, along with Dr James Biddulph, has recently launched the UK’s first Teaching Assistant Network Hub. In her spare time, Aimee is currently studying with the Open University.

Sarah has worked for over 20 years in the post 16 education sector and feels most comfortable working alongside students and teams who need something different to the regular. Sarah is motivated by: 

• developing aggressive aspirations with teams and students to impact on lives and communities
• watching people grow and then instilling the confidence to push them further
• innovation - never settling for anything – Kaizen!
• challenging herself to change the language used about inclusion to challenge established norms

After starting his professional journey in education as a temporary librarian in 2002, Peter has performed many different roles in FE: mentor, coach, child protection officer, prison liaison, support coordinator, and behaviour lead. Peter is currently the Project and Delivery Manager for the Centre for Excellence in SEND at Derby College Group. Peter's passions focus particularly on: 

• neurodiversity
• behaviour
• personalisation, and
• positive decision making

Teresa Quail is a Qualified Teacher of  the Deaf and Educational Audiologist. She works part-time as a co-National Executive Officer and Magazine Editor with the British Association of Teachers of the Deaf (BATOD). BATOD is the sole professional association for Teachers of the Deaf in the UK. The Association represents the interests of Teachers of the Deaf and the children and young people they teach with a range of Government and other agencies. The Association supports Teachers of the Deaf and organises CPD courses and national and regional meetings to provide relevant up-to-date information and to disseminate good practice. 

Teresa was the Head of the Specialist Teaching Service in a local authority in England maintaining an active caseload across the 0-25 age range. During the pandemic she worked part-time in a secondary school resource base in England. She will soon be commencing a peripatetic QToD role in Northern Ireland.

With over thirty years of contribution to service provision in the disability and autism sectors as a consultant and specialist tutor. Mark recognised the opportunity to combine the WEA/IMAS ‘Inclusion in Rugby’ and ‘Inclusion in Sports’ projects with a national training programme. Mark now works with a number of NGB’s and leads on the training and delivery of Mixed Ability Sports to grassroots clubs across England