Our Board

Andrew Day

Andrew is Principal of Haberdashers’ Aske’s Knights Academy in Lewisham, an all-through 3 – 18 Academy. He also sits as a member of the Executive team of the Haberdashers’ Aske’s Federation.

Born and educated in South Africa, Andrew attended the Universities of Stellenbosch, Cape Town and Durham,UK and is a teacher of English. He has taught in both the independent and state sectors, both in South Africa and in the United Kingdom. He spent several years as the managing partner of a travel company and as a director of an international human rights charity, before returning to school leadership as a member of the first cohort of the Future Leaders programme in the Summer of 2006.

He also works extensively on development projects in Southern Africa, building capacity in school leadership and in the development of the support infrastructure within schools.  

Baroness (Sally) Morgan of Huyton

Baroness (Sally) Morgan of Huyton currently works as adviser to the Board of the charity, ARK, and is also chair of Future Leaders. She is a non-executive director of both Carphone Warehouse and Southern Cross Healthcare. Sally also sits on the board of the Olympic Delivery Authority.

As a member of the House of Lords since 2001, her particular interests are public services and, as a former Minister for Women, equality issues. Sally worked for Tony Blair from 1995 and then in No10 Downing Street as Director of Government Relations until May 2005. Sally started her career as a secondary school teacher. 

Jo Owen

 Jo Owen is one of the founders of Teach First, as well as Teaching Leaders and Future Leaders. He has also founded Start Up, which gets offenders to start their own businesses on release from prison. He is the author of ten management books, including How to Lead and Tribal Business School. He has built a business in Japan, started a bank and was a partner at Accenture. He has been sued for $12 billion, was the best nappy salesman in Birmingham, put the blue speckle in Daz and has sold his own blood in Afghanistan. 

Sue Williamson

Sue Williamson is Strategic Director of Leadership and Innovation at the Specialist Schools and Academies Trust (SSAT).  She joined the Trust in April 2002 and has played a leading role in its development and expansion.  She is responsible for the Trust's National Conference. Sue has worked closely with Professor David Hargreaves in developing the personalising learning agenda, the introduction of development and research networks and system redesign.

Sue has worked with Headteachers to design and develop the Leadership and Innovation Academy.  She created the concept of iNet (international networking for educational transformation) – the Trust's international arm.  There are now nearly 2,000 schools from 32 countries affiliated to iNet.  She is also responsible for the work of SSAT Abu Dhabi, where the SSAT is supporting the work of 21 schools.

Prior to joining the Trust, Sue was Headteacher at Monks’ Dyke Technology College for eight years.  Under her leadership the College’s GCSE results went from 15% A-C to 56%.  Sue has an honorary doctorate from the University of Wolverhampton and is the author of three pamphlets – Deep Support 1, System Redesign 4 – Personalising Relationships, and Leading System Redesign: the changing profession.

Brett Wigdortz

Brett Wigdortz wrote the original business plan for Teach First while working as a management consultant at McKinsey & Company and then took what was originally planned as a six-month leave of absence in February 2002 to develop and build support for the idea; he has been CEO since July 2002.  

Before coming to London, he was a consultant in Indonesia, Singapore, and Manila - focusing on retail banking, organisational effectiveness, and Asian microfinance. Prior to McKinsey, Brett developed Southeast Asia policy and business programmes at the Asia Society in New York City. He has also worked as a journalist in Asia and as a researcher at the East- West Centre in Honolulu, focusing on energy and economic development issues.

He and has an Honours Bachelors degree and a Masters, both in Economics. He also serves as a trustee of Promoting Equality in African Schools (PEAS) and is the co-founder, trustee & chief strategy advisor of Teach For All, an organisation created in partnership with Teach For America to help other countries share best practices among similar programmes and create a global network of leaders dedicated to addressing educational disadvantage.

He was named the 2007 UK Ernst & Young Social Entrepreneur of the Year and the 2010 Council for the Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) European Leadership Award. Brett is married with two small children.