Bath and Wells Multi Academy Trust

Trustees (ID 1084)

• Beverley Hobbs
  Chair of Trustees
  Beverley Hobbs

  Retired in 2023 from her role as CEO of a small multi-academy trust, Beverley has served as headteacher in three mainstream secondary schools, most recently an outstanding Church of England 11-18 academy in Berkshire. In her role as CEO, she acted as lead education professional for day-to-day operations within the trust and had responsibility for working alongside the chair of trustees to create, evolve and deliver the trust's strategic development plan. In addition, she line managed the head of finance and operations and the headteachers of the member schools, enabling her to maintain a detailed understanding of the challenges and opportunities experienced within both the primary and secondary phase.

  Since retiring from the role of headteacher in 2019, Beverley has been appointed as director in another multi-academy trust based in Oxfordshire in which she is chair of the education committee. That same year she also began sitting as a magistrate, enabling her to put to use some of the key skills developed as a result of a lengthy career in school leadership.

  Membership of her local church community continues to play a key part in Beverley's personal life. She continues to serve as secretary to the PCC, a role which, like the magistracy, calls for an understanding of human nature - very familiar territory for anyone with experience of working in schools and leadership.

  Beverley was appointed by the Diocese of Bath and Wells to the Board as a Foundation Trustee, and her current term of office is 12.09.2023- 11.09.2027

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• Andrew Donnell
  Vice Chair of Trustees
  Andrew Donnell

  Prior to retirement, Andy was the CEO for EMEA of facilities management (FM) services provider ABM, with responsibility for the growth and performance of ABM Group activities in the UK, Europe and the Middle East. Andy has been a Board Director for over 20 years and, for 15 years, has led the organisation, having worked either as CEO or Chairman. He developed an award-winning strategy, 'ROBUST', based on the company's values, which in turn led to a doubling of revenue and profits over three years, a significant achievement in the industry. He has a wealth of experience in corporate governance and, latterly, charity Governance in his role both in Samaritans and as Chair of The Moving on Project.

  Andy's track record demonstrates a keen strategic mind with a passion for business growth, matched only by his enthusiasm for investing in people and developing the next generation to start work. This is reflected in his strategic initiative, the JEEP junior engineer engagement program, which encourages more school children to become involved in apprenticeships. This scheme has now become recognised nationally and is being rolled out across schools.

  He also serves as a Parish Councillor, reflecting his commitment to community engagement. He holds a Master's degree in Social Policy and has extensive experience in governance, as well as a dedication to youth development, aligning firmly with the Trust's mission to provide inclusive, values-driven education. Outside of work, he enjoys kite surfing, golf, and spending time with his two lively Vizslas, Bert and Ernie.

• Tamara Dexter
  Foundation Trustee
  Tamara Dexter

  Tamara has worked in education for over 20 years in four different Trusts and five local authorities. She has substantial experience of delivering strategic leadership that has resulted in demonstrable school and Trust success including achieving outstanding OFSTED inspections in multiple schools.

  In addition to her current role as an Executive Headteacher and Trust Inclusion, Safeguarding and EYFS leader, she is a 'Local Leader of Education and Headteacher Advocate for the Boolean Maths Hub, a 'DFE Area Lead' for the EYFS Covid Recovery Programme and a Visiting Fellow for Five Counties.

  Tamara is a strong advocate for continuous school improvement and as a 'School Improvement Lead' has joined multiple executive teams to complete internal school review visits for Early Years, Primary, Secondary and SEND provisions, supporting with the identification of current school strengths alongside making recommendations for improvements. She has completed the National Award for SEND Coordination, NPQSL, NPQH and NPQEL to support professional development.

  Tamara is committed to school governance and sits on an Education Standard Committee for a large Trust in the Southwest. She was appointed as a Trustee to Bath and Wells in March 2024.

• Claire Hudson
  Foundation Trustee
  Claire Hudson

  Claire has significant education governance experience at trust level as a Trustee and Member, as well as at primary, secondary and specialist school phases. She was a National Leader of Governance from 2016-2021 and during this time she specialised in working with inadequate schools, as well as undertaking governance reviews. Claire is the Assistant Director of Education (Partnerships for School Flourishing) at the Diocese of Bath & Wells; her responsibilities include governance, training and the Diocesan school estate. She is a trained ACAS investigator and has undertaken a number of independent HR investigations for LAs and MATs. Claire is passionate about ensuring the equality of opportunity for all children.

• Charlotte Taylor
  Foundation Methodist Trustee
  Charlotte Taylor

  Before becoming a teacher, Charlotte explored a variety of professions including; working in a residential special school, a semi-secure unit for 5-19-year olds, volunteering in India and nannying in New York.

  For the past 25 years Charlotte has been involved in church school education and embraced all of the challenges this has brought. Much of that time Charlotte dedicated to one community, building trust and knowledge over two generations. As the Headteacher and later Executive Headteacher at Holly Hill Church School, she inspired a culture of flourishing and a deep-rooted belief in all children being the best that they can be. At the heart of a community with high deprivation, the school ranked in the top 10% for reading, writing and Maths progress scores nationally, beginning the journey of realising social capital for those most disadvantaged.

  Sharing knowledge and working collaboratively with colleagues has always been important and so becoming a Birmingham Leader of Education, supporting with reading and early phonics and leadership development was a joy.

  In 2019, Charlotte became part of the central team for Methodist schools, spending the last 2 years of her career as head of service overseeing standards and ethos of 66 Methodist and joint Anglican/ Methodist schools across England. She was a serving SIAMS inspector for a number of years. Now retired, she frequently travels and enjoys the gift of time.

• Jamie Donald
  Trustee
  Jamie Donald

  Jamie Donald is a seasoned commercial leader with over 20 years of experience driving strategic growth and customer success in the financial services and technology sectors. Currently serving as Global Account Director at Salesforce, Jamie leads the enterprise relationship with Barclays Bank, delivering innovative digital solutions that enable transformation at scale for their customers and colleagues.

  Prior to Salesforce, Jamie held senior roles across fintech and enterprise SaaS, including Head of Sales for Financial Services at YellowDog and Customer Engagement Manager for EMEA at Earnix. His earlier career includes leadership positions in strategy, business development, and marketing at firms such as Moneyhub Enterprise and Brightside Group plc.

  Jamie holds a BA in Business Studies & Media Communications from Bath Spa University. He is passionate about building trusted partnerships, driving digital innovation, and enabling long-term business value.

• Andrew Gordon-Brown
  Foundation Trustee
  Andrew Gordon-Brown

  Andrew joined Kingswood School, Bath, in September 2020 as Headmaster and Principal of the Foundation. He moved to Bath from Cornwall where he spent seven years as Headmaster of Truro School, having previously been Deputy Headmaster at Stonyhurst College and at Radley College where he began his school career and qualified as a teacher.

  Andrew studied at Hyde Park High School in Johannesburg, the University of Cape Town and later Keble College, Oxford. He is a qualified Chartered Accountant.

  Prior to his career switch into teaching, Andrew enjoyed a 12 year career in banking and finance, as well as rowing for South Africa at the 1992 Olympics and for Oxford University in the 1994 Boat Race. This has allowed him to bring life lessons from a variety of experiences to his teaching career, including the importance of working as a team. Andrew is particularly committed to empowering others to be the best they can. He is a reader in his local church.

  Married with three children, Andrew is both a sportsman and a music lover. He is a founding trustee of a charity whose teachers deliver much of the music in schools across Cornwall. He also currently serves as a Director of the International Association of Methodist Schools, Colleges and Universities.

• Mark Gordon
  Trustee
  Mark Gordon

  Mark is a Chartered Accountant who has worked in the engineering and information technology sectors. He has extensive experience in financial, commercial and risk management. More recently Mark has been involved in the charity sector and his current role is the Chief Operating Officer at the Chartered Institute of Export and International Trade.

  Mark enjoys all business development and improvement activities with particular emphasis on the development of leaders of the future.

  Mark holds a B.Sc. in Economics with Computing and Statistics from the University of Bath and has a Financial Times Non-Executive Director Diploma. Mark lives in the Southwest of England and enjoys mountain biking and sailing.

Members (ID 1087)

• Tracey Khodabandehloo
  Tracey is also Chair of the Diocesan Board of Education
  Tracey Khodabandehloo

• Ed Gregory
  Ed is also Director of Education at the Bath and Wells Diocese.
  Ed Gregory

• John Swainston
  John Swainston

  John graduated from Durham University in 1970, also completing his teacher training year in Durham. He began teaching Maths and Science in the secondary sector before becoming Head of Year 7 in one of Leicestershire's pioneering Junior High Schools (11-14). From there John moved into the 9-13 Middle Schools in the North-east, as Deputy Head of one, then successively Head of three others.

  John then moved into system leadership, firstly as an LA Adviser, then Director of an inner-city Education Action Zone, DfE Senior Adviser (under Professor David Hopkins) and Assistant Director of Children's Services in a very large LA (342 schools). Lastly, he moved to the South-West in 2012 as Director of Education for the Diocese of Bristol and CEO of their growing Diocesan MAT. He retired in 2019 after a career in Education spanning 47 years. In his retirement, John is committed to BWMAT and has worked closely with a number of our Local Governing Committees and has served as Chair of our Education Committee.

  John was appointed by the Diocese of Bath and Wells to the Board as a Foundation Trustee in 2021 and became a Member in September 2024.

• Steve Colledge
  Steve Colledge

  Steve spent most of his career in secondary schools. He has always been committed to ensuring student-centred schools and that staff are committed to delivering a great experience for their students. He believes that education is about developing an informed, pleasant and engaging character who has achieved their best and acquired a love of lifelong learning and cares for others.

  He held senior leadership positions in secondary schools for 28 years, working in a range of rural and urban locations in Essex, Gloucestershire, South Gloucestershire and Swindon. These posts included low and high performing settings and two headships. His two headships required that he brought about substantial change and built sustainable new cultures. As a result of this work Steve became a National Leader of Education.

  In 2011 his school became an early ‘converter academy’ and soon joined with the first local primary multi-academy trust to create a cross-phase organisation including a teaching school. Steve became Secondary Director of the expanded multi-academy trust. This gave him considerable opportunity to work with primary schools as well as secondary schools in developing leadership and driving effective school improvement.

  Steve has served on Governing Bodies and Interim Boards in secondary, primary and special schools and continued as an area Chair of Secondary Headteachers until July 2019. He has been Chair of Schools Forum in two local authorities and has sat on several local authority working groups. Steve was also a DFE Education Adviser and an OFSTED Inspector.

  Following retirement Steve became an education consultant and his work has focused on quality assurance, peer to peer support and school improvement in both secondary and primary schools.

  Steve is a Methodist member of the Cirencester Ashcroft Methodist/URC Church where he has an active role within the Church Community.

  Steve was appointed by the Diocese of Bath and Wells to the Board as a Foundation Trustee in 2022 and became a Member in September 2024.

• Simon Hill
  Simon Hill