Expert panel

Sir Michael Barber is a leading authority on education systems and reform. He leads Pearson’s worldwide programme of research into education policy and efficacy, advises on and supports the development of products and services that build on the research findings, and plays a particular role in Pearson’s strategy for education in the poorest sectors of the world, particularly in fast-growing developing economies.

He was previously a partner at McKinsey & Company and head of McKinsey’s global education practice. He is also Distinguished Visiting Fellow at the Harvard Graduate School of Education and holds an honorary doctorate from the University of Exeter. He previously served the UK government as head of the Prime Minister’s delivery unit (from 2001-2005) and as chief adviser to the Secretary of State for Education on school standards (from 1997-2001). He is the author of several books including Instruction to Deliver; The Learning Game: Arguments for an Education Revolution and How to do the Impossible: a Guide for Politicians with a Passion for Education.

Professor Schwartz is currently the Francis Keppel professor of practice of educational policy and administration for the Harvard Graduate School of Education. He has held a wide variety of leadership positions in education and government before joining the HGSE faculty in 1996. From 1997 to 2002, Schwartz also served as president of Achieve, Inc., an independent, non-profit organisation created by governors and corporate leaders to help states improve their schools.

Professor Schwartz has also been a high school English teacher and principal; an education advisor to the mayor of Boston and the governor of Massachusetts; an assistant director of the National Institute of Education; a special assistant to the president of the University of Massachusetts; and executive director of The Boston Compact, a public-private partnership designed to improve access to higher education and employment for urban high school graduates. He is co-author of Pathways to Prosperity: Meeting the Challenge of Preparing Young Americans for the 21st Century; co-editor of The Futures of School Reform; and a contributor to Surpassing Shanghai: An Agenda for American Education Built on the World's Leading Systems.

Janice Kay has been provost of the University of Exeter since August 2014. Janice is responsible for overseeing and delivering the institutional strategy, resource and business planning of the university's six colleges and its professional services.

Before starting her current role, Janice spent ten years as the deputy vice-chancellor for education. Under this role, the university has always been in the UK National Student Survey top ten, and has increased its undergraduate student numbers in the past three years by over 50%. For six years, Janice chaired the UK 1994 Group Student Experience Policy Group. She is passionate about global Higher Education and is a vice chair of the Higher Education Academy.

She played an important role in the development of the university's strategy for science, which has seen the expansion of its science, engineering and medicine base by 25%. She was also responsible for the creation of the new medical school, which has some of the world's most highly cited researchers, and was recently ranked 13th in all UK medical schools for the quality of its clinical research.

She is on the boards of the South West Academic Health Science Network, Health Education South West, the Royal Devon and Exeter NHS Foundation Trust and the Higher Education Funding Council for England Quality, Accountability and Regulation Strategic Advisory Committee.

She helped to set up the Exeter Mathematics School (one of two in the country, with Kings College London) and the new 2–16 Education Campus at Cranbrook, Exeter, and is chair of the new South Devon University Technical College. Janice has been prominent in widening access initiatives, nationally and regionally. She is a professor of cognitive neuropsychology, first appointed to Exeter through a Wellcome Trust university lectureship.

Professor Jonathan Osborne holds the Shriram Family Professor of Science endowed chair at Stanford University, California. He joined Stanford in 2009 after 23 years at King’s College in London, where he was head of department from 2005-2008. He began his career as a high school physics teacher, teaching in London high schools for 12 years. He gained his PhD in Science Education in 1995 from King’s College London. He was a co-editor of the report Beyond 2000: Science Education for the Future. In 2002, he was an advisor to the UK House of Commons Science and Technology Committee for their report on science education.

He was president of the US National Association for Research in Science Teaching (2006-2007) and has won the association’s award for the best research publication in 2003 and 2004 in the Journal of Research in Science Teaching. He was a member of the US National Academies Panel that produced the new framework for the next generation standards in science. Currently he is chair of the expert group responsible for producing the framework for the OECD Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) science assessments in 2015 and a member of the expert group for designing the accompanying questionnaires. His research interests are the role of argumentation in science and improving the teaching of literacy in science.

Bahram Bekhradnia became the first director of the Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI) on its creation on 1 November 2002. HEPI is an independent think tank concerned with higher education policy. It has achieved an international reputation for rigorous and objective research and analysis, advising governments in 20 different countries as well as international agencies. HEPI is now one of the most widely referenced and influential independent bodies concerned with higher education policy. Before creating HEPI, Bahram was the director of policy for the Higher Education Funding Council for England.

Bahram holds a degree in Literae Humaniores from the University of Oxford and honorary degrees from the University of North London and BPP University College, and has been a visiting professor at the University of Bath and the London University Institute of Education. Until recently he was on the governing council of the UK Arts and Humanities Research Council. He was also special adviser to the former IUSS Parliamentary Select Committee until it was disbanded.

Since 2008 Bahram has been a member of the editorial board of the Times Higher Education magazine, and in 2009 he chaired the Ditchley Park Conference on Higher Education. In March 2012 he was appointed as a member of the Higher Education Authority of Ireland.

Jane joined the John Lewis Partnership as a graduate trainee in retail at the flagship store in Oxford Street. She continued in the retail division and gained further operational experience across a number of branches and functions, including personnel and distribution. She held the post of general manager in John Lewis Milton Keynes and John Lewis Brent Cross, before transferring to head office as head of internal communications. Jane became the head of partner development in 2011.

Jane has a keen interest in vocational qualifications and has been associated with the charitable organisation cfa, and its parent body Instructus since 2004, firstly as a trustee and more recently as the chair of the trustee board. She is a fellow of the CIPD.

Dr Hill is the former chief executive of the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA). Before that, he was an educational consultant on projects in Australia, Canada, Hong Kong, the Middle East, the United Kingdom and the USA. From 2004 to 2007, Dr Hill was secretary general of the Hong Kong Examinations and Assessment Authority, where he played a key role in developing and implementing changes in curriculum, assessment and certification in a major reform. He has been head of a major curriculum and examination authority in Australia and Hong Kong, head of the Victorian Department of School Education, professor of education at the University of Melbourne and director of research and development of the National Center on Education and the Economy in the US.

Professor Lee Sing Kong is the dean and managing director of the National Institute of Education International in Singapore. After a career in the civil service, Professor Lee joined NIE in 1991 and worked in various leadership positions.

In 2000, as dean of the graduate programmes and research office, he implemented a wide range of professional development initiatives to help teachers to build on their experience and acquire postgraduate certification.

He was appointed director of NIE in 2006 and concurrently served as dean of the external programmes office (EPO) which evolved into NIE International Pte Ltd.

During his career, Professor Lee was responsible for many key initiatives that have greatly impacted teacher education in Singapore and internationally. He led in the articulation of the 3:3:3 Roadmap outlining NIE's strategic directions from 2007-2012, guiding NIE to achieve its vision of becoming an institute of distinction.

In 2007, he served as the inaugural chair of the International Alliance of Leading Education Institutes, putting NIE firmly in the global league of teacher education providers.

Professor Lee also serves as vice president (education strategies) at the Nanyang Technological University (NTU) with a focus on strategies to help Higher Education keep abreast with 21st century needs.

Sally Coates was principal of Burlington Danes Academy, an 11–18 Ark Academy in Hammersmith and Fulham. The school has 67% pupil premium and mostly serves the very deprived White City estate. The school results in the last two years have almost doubled and this year the GCSE results including English and Maths were 80% 5 A*-C with 43% eBacc. Sally was acting as executive principal at Evelyn Grace Academy in Brixton until July 2012 and was executive principal of Ark Putney and West London Free School until July 2014.

Sally was previously head of Sacred Heart School, an Ofsted ‘outstanding’ VA school in Camberwell, London Borough of Southwark. She has always worked in inner city schools in London and has been in teaching since 1976. Sally started work as an English Teacher at Peckham Girls, now The Academy at Peckham.

Sally chaired the independent review of teachers’ standards in 2011 and most recently chaired the Skills Test Review. She also served as a member of the Key Stage 2 Test Review Committee under the chairmanship of Lord Bew.

In September 2014 Sally was appointed director of academies south for the United Learning Trust. Sally was made a Dame Commander of the British Empire (DBE) in the 2013 New Year honours list.

Ursula Renold has led the research centre for comparative education system at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zurich since April 2013. She is also chairman of the university board of the University of Applied Sciences and Arts, North West Switzerland.

Ursula was a visiting fellow at Harvard Graduate School of Education between September 2012 and March 2013. Prior to this, she was director general of the Federal Office for Professional Education and Technology (OPET). In this position she led Switzerland‘s competence centre for professional education, universities of applied sciences, and innovation. Before becoming director general, she was head of OPET’s vocational education and training division and director of the Swiss Federal Institute of Vocational Education and Training (teacher education).

Ursula Renold started her career as an apprentice and went on to obtain the academic baccalaureate and then study history, economics and sociology. After graduation, she worked as a senior fellow at the Institute for Behavioural Sciences of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich (ETHZ). She gained a PhD in social sciences in 1998 from the University of Berne. Since 2010, she has been honorary professor in professional education at the University of Applied Labour Studies in Mannheim (Germany).

Jason Holt is CEO of the Holts Group, comprising five businesses spanning jewellery manufacture and retailing (Holts), education (Holts Academy and Platform) and technology (Holition and Holition Travel Retail). The Holts Group currently employs over 100 staff.

In 1999 Jason left his job as a solicitor in a city law firm to join the Holts family business, which specialises in bespoke jewellery manufacture. This was a springboard to what is now the Holts Group, including the not-for-profit social enterprise Holts Academy, which was set up out of concern for the lack of new talent being brought into the industry. Holts Academy is now the sole provider of government accredited apprenticeships in jewellery.

Jason holds the Queen’s Award for Enterprise Promotion, is a Freeman and Liveryman of the City of London and Goldsmiths Company, and won Outstanding Contribution to the Jewellery Industry at the UK Jewellery Awards 2012.

Jason is the author of the government review on making apprenticeships more accessible to small and medium-sized enterprises. The report was published in August 2012 and ministers are now implementing the agreed recommendations.

In June 2013 Jason was appointed apprenticeship ambassador for SMEs by the National Apprenticeship Service, supported by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills and Department for Education.

In February 2014 he was appointed chair of the government's craft Trailblazer apprenticeship initiative.