How Ark's governance works
Every school in the Ark network is the legal responsibility of the Ark Schools Board. This board focuses on statutory duties and delegates most day-to-day responsibilities to each school’s individual Local Governing Body (LGB).
This means that our Academy's governors are able to concentrate on the things that really matter – educational strategy, school outcomes and aspiration.
The Ark Schools Decision Making Framework outlines where responsibility and accountability sits for the key functional areas within Ark Schools between the ‘tiers’ of governance.
Our Local Governing Body
Our Local Governing Body (LGB) is made up of 6-10 members – usually people with a local connection or interest who are committed to supporting educational opportunity in the area. The board generally includes:
- Academy Principal
- Up to two Parent Governors
- One Teaching Staff Governor
- One Non-teaching Staff Governor
- One Local Authority representative
We aim to create a balanced group that will have the right skills, connections and dynamic for the LGB to work well and support the school in achieving exceptional performance. Attributes we look for include:
- Good insight into the specific challenges at the school and the general challenges of operating top-quality schools
- Excellent community links
- Specific skills as needed by/relevant to the school
- A link to the senior executive team of Ark Schools
All appointments are made by the Director of Governance for Ark Schools. The term of a governor is three years, except for the Principal, who remains a governor for the duration of his or her time in post. Governors may be reappointed for further terms.
The LGB meets four times a year.
Becoming a governor
If you have an interest and commitment to improving education, and would like to make a difference within your community, please register your interest in becoming a governor by completing our online Governor Application Form. If you have any questions about a governor’s role or responsibilities please contact us at governance.team@arkonline.org
A full programme of induction, training and support is provided. You can see more information, including role specifications here.
Contacting the governors
The current Clerk to Governors is Titilola Kehinde (titilola.kehinde@arkonline.org). Please contact them if you have any governance-related queries, or would like to contact one of the governors.
Our Governors
Lizzie Gaisman
Lizzie works for JPMorgan Chase & Company, and her career to date spans the private, public and social sectors. She has been passionate about education ever since she was the youngest member of her senior school council at the age of 11. She is a lifelong south-west Londoner, having grown up in Richmond and lived in SW12 for nearly a decade. She and her husband and young children rotate around the area's excellent playgrounds on repeat. Lizzie holds an MBA from Harvard and a Bachelor's Degree in History from Oxford.
James Baker
James has lived in Battersea since 2009 and has been heavily involved in the local community since then. A former barrister, James now works as a corporate communications consultant and lobbyist specialising in advising major global businesses on public relations, government affairs and corporate responsibility. Having grown up in nearby Richmond, James knows the area well and is also a supporter of Spinal Muscular Atrophy Support UK and the Disabled Children’s Partnership.
Victoria Davies
Victoria Davies is a local parent with 3 children attending Bolingbroke Academy. As a parent Governor, she aims to engage positively with the parent body to support the school in delivering an outstanding education and being a source of pride to its students and the wider community. Victoria has 25 years’ experience in strategy, financial planning, change management and performance measurement gained at the London Stock Exchange Group and in the Information and Media industries. Victoria was educated at a comprehensive school in Nottinghamshire and studied at the University of Oxford, where she read PPE. She is a keen cyclist, Bolingbroke Parents Association and local charity volunteer and participates in numerous mentoring programmes for young professionals.
Katharine Jackson
A commercial executive with a professional financial background who has worked for over 20 years in digital publishing for both secondary and higher education sectors. A track record of executive and non-executive experience providing strong oversight and governance with a deep commitment to inclusion and equality of access to education as the foundation for a healthy, flourishing society. A mother of five children who have attended different state secondary schools in the South London area, (two at Bolingbroke Academy) using my knowledge of a variety of educational settings and my collaborative and mentoring skills for positive impact.
Suzy Pett
Suzy Pett is Assistant Head at Wimbledon High, with responsibility for teaching and learning across the school. Prior to this she was Head of English at Wimbledon High and previously worked at Surbiton High. She is passionate about creating an ethos of classroom excellence. She won Pearson’s Outstanding New Teacher of the Year award in 2014, has spoken at BETT (the world’s leading education technology show) and loves to chat about literature. She has founded and continues to lead a literacy project, now in its tenth year, with schools in the Akwapim Region of Ghana. In her spare time she enjoys running round Wimbledon Common.
Aled Richards-Jones
Aled is a councillor on Wandsworth Borough Council, representing Northcote ward which takes in Ark Bolingbroke Academy. As a local councillor, he has seen Ark Bolingbroke Academy grow into an outstanding local state school and, having been educated in state primary and secondary schools himself, joined the Governing Board to support the school's continued growth and success. Prior to becoming a governor, Aled lead Oxbridge mock interviews for the school. He has previous experience as a governor of a local Wandsworth primary school for 7 years.
Aled studied Chemistry at the University of Oxford, and postgraduate law at the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Oxford. He qualified as a barrister in 2016 and has since practised in intellectual property and commercial law.
Karen Robinson
Karen Robinson is the Research and Development Leader at Bolingbroke academy, responsible for the reading programme, the library and careers provision. She started her career in public libraries and has worked in a number of schools supporting literacy development with parents and toddlers to sixth formers. She has been a Governor at a Primary school for the past 6 years and is now happy to take on this role at Bolingbroke Academy.
Iandra Tchoudnowsky
Having grown up and been schooled in numerous different countries, Iandra came to the UK to finish her studies at Oxford. After nearly ten years as a solicitor in the City, Iandra moved to Moscow where she set up and has been actively engaged over the past 11 years in an education consultancy that aims to mentor students to find the right educational outcome for them. She has also chaired a charity committee that was involved with over 20 different charities. A firm believer that a solid education combined with strong support for mental health and wellbeing are the key to most children's success, Iandra has been involved with school mentoring and has an advisory role in the reform of a school in Mexico City.
