Governors Profiles

I took up the Headship here at Pennyhill in April 2015 and I really enjoy working here. I am an experienced Headteacher. I was previously the Headteacher of a village school in Yorkshire and just before joining Pennyhill, I was the Headteacher of a nearby Birmingham school.

The relationship between the Headteacher and the governing board is a crucially important one. I feel incredibly lucky to have worked with so many dedicated and talented governors throughout my teaching career and continue to do so today at Pennyhill. I am often astounded and totally grateful for the commitment, effort and time that governors give voluntarily to our school and feel that we have the firm foundations to continue to move our school forward.

I am usually on the playground in the morning as the children are coming in. If you need to quickly ask me something or share some information, then that’s often a good opportunity to catch me.

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Being Sandwell born and bred, this is the only authority I have chosen to work in as I really wanted to give something back to my local community. Having started teaching in a primary school, I then moved into secondary education as a drama teacher, quickly progressing to Assistant Head of Year there before becoming Head of Year. I had a short spell as an Assistant Head teacher in a special-educational-needs school before moving back in to mainstream education as an Assistant Head teacher in charge of Lower School.

More recently, I have stepped out of the classroom and now work for the Local Authority as the Transition Manager from Key Stage 2-3, where I feel I can have a bigger impact on a growing number of children.

All this and I somehow found time to raise 2 wonderful kids who are currently in years 6 and 8!

When I retired from Birmingham City Council as a Policy & Performance manager in 2013, I left the public sector with 30 years’ experience, gained through time working in the probation service, being a welfare rights worker and helping to regenerate run down areas. Prior to retirement, I worked as part of the corporate team in order to support Birmingham City Council’s Executive Management Team, where I was responsible for leading service improvement reviews and for monitoring the Council’s delivery of key priorities.

I am passionate about making sure that all children at Pennyhill have the best start in life and, as such, I enjoy my role as Chair of the Standards & Achievement Committee at Pennyhill greatly. The Committee works to support the Head Teacher and all staff on our improvement journey by tracking the progress of all pupils across each year group and individual subject, checking that actions to drive up their performance are effective, and focusing on identifying, enhancing and developing areas that require further improvement.

We always welcome new and innovative approaches to continually raising standards in the school too, and are continually looking carefully to identify what works best in and across the school.

I am married with two grown up children and, before having our children, I worked for a local company in sales accounts. When both of our children were at school, I began working as an LSA at Charlemont Primary School, where I was part of the merger when the two adjoining schools merged to form Pennyhill Primary. Since then, I have passed my level 3 qualification to become an LSP. Whilst working as an LSA/LSP, I have worked with children from nursery age right through to year 6 in their SATs year. As I am from West Bromwich originally and have lived locally to this school for over 25 years, I have a strong affinity to the local community; as this area means a lot to me, I will do my utmost to ensure that the children who attend Pennyhill have the best education they possibly can whilst they are here.

My name is Michelle Williams and I have been proud to be the Deputy Headteacher at Pennyhill Primary since coming here in September 2015. I am an experienced Senior Leader: in my previous school, I was the Deputy Headteacher for 5 years and was also a Staff Representative on their Governing Body. In addition to these roles, I have also been an English consultant for Birmingham Local Authority as part of their Every Child a Writer Project.

Currently in school, I oversee and am responsible for Safeguarding, Assessment, Teaching and Learning and Inclusion. As well as this, I am also an Associate Governor and am part of the Standards and Achievement committee, for which I track children’s progress in school and present this to Governors during the committee’s meetings.

I am always available both before and after school to talk to parents.

I am honoured to undertake the role of Parent governor at Pennyhill, whereby I am the link governor for Mathematics and the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS). Having previously worked for the Department for Education, I fully understand and appreciate the importance of creating a high quality learning environment, one that all children – regardless of their personal circumstances – ought to have access to. I will work collaboratively with both parents and school staff to ensure that Pennyhill strives to establish and maintain the highest standards of education for all pupils enrolled there, whilst at the same time ensuring that appropriate challenge is provided when necessary.

I served as a school Governor at Pennyhill several years ago when my children attended the school, and have fond memories of the school, both as a governor and a parent. I have worked for Sandwell Libraries now for over 30 years and have always seen it as a dual-role, supporting schools on their literacy journeys and supporting families in their reading journeys. I work across several libraries around Sandwell and I find that working with children is one of my favourite aspects of the job. In that regard, I am committed to making a positive contribution to Pennyhill and to ensuring that all children get a well-rounded, good-quality education in a safe environment.

I have spent my career in the education sector teaching in a number of different countries, as well as in primary schools across different local authorities in England: schools in Birmingham, Coventry and Sandwell for collectively for the past twenty-three years. For the last three years of this time, I have worked as an Assistant Headteacher here at Pennyhill Primary School. The school has changed significantly over the last three years, making fantastic strides forwards and becoming a good school based on the hard working leadership team, teaching and support staff and also the children, who are working extremely hard to improve the quality of their work in all subject and curriculum areas. My aim as a governor marries up very nicely to my role here as an Assistant Headteacher: to ensure that I can play a prominent part in the continued improvement of Pennyhill so that the children have the best education they possibly can here in order to set them up for their future lives. I am fully committed to supporting Miss Williams and her team's excellent work (which they are doing consistently on a daily basis) and in their drive to ensuring that Pennyhill and its pupils achieve their maximum potential.

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