Eric Winstone, head of Bushfield Community College in Peterborough, has been appointed principal designate of Ormiston Bushfield Academy, due to open in September. He has been head of Bushfield for seven years and his previous posts include deputy principal at Sir Harry Smith Community College in Cambridgeshire. The academy will specialise in maths and sport, as well as performing arts.
Halina Simpson is the new chair of ATG Training. Formerly its director of learning and skills, Ms Simpson worked for the charity for 19 years and, during that time, it gained accreditation as a centre of vocational excellence in engineering and cycle maintenance. She took over from David Granshaw, who helped to deliver a major expansion of ATG.
Chris McLoughlin is the new service director at Stockport Council, overseeing social care and health in the children and young people’s directorate. She is taking over from Michael Jameson in August. He has moved to Oldham Council as director of the children and young people’s directorate.
Ms McLoughlin has been in local government for more than 20 years and is now working for the city council as a district manager for children’s services in central Manchester. At Stockport, she will have responsibility for children’s health, which will involve managing fostering, adoption and residential care services.
The Royal Geographical Society has given four teachers chartered geographer status. Ruth Totterdell, Elizabeth Crisp, Clare Sladden and Justin Woolliscroft were officially recognised for their competence, experience and professionalism in the use of geographical knowledge in and out of the classroom. A former geography teacher, Ms Totterdell is on secondment to the Geographical Association as the national subject lead in geography. Ms Crisp is head of geography at St Margaret’s School for Girls in Aberdeen, and Ms Sladden is an examiner and education and assessment consultant, mainly for the University of Cambridge local examinations syndicate. Mr Woolliscroft is also an education consultant and is responsible for the GA’s secondary quality mark.
Community activist Breige Brownlee has joined the Belfast Education and Library Board and will sit on its youth and finance committee. Ms Brownlee has been a Belfast city councillor for three months and replaces Marie Moore, who died recently. Ms Brownlee, who represents Lower Falls, was born in St James, and still lives there.
Alan Bedford, a longstanding troubleshooter for the NHS, has become the new chair of Brighton and Hove local safeguarding children board, which oversees the safety and wellbeing of children in the area. Mr Bedford has previously been chief executive of children’s charity the NSPCC.
DESMOND TUTU
Three cheers for Desmond Tutu, who has written to Gordon Brown and the other G8 leaders to set up a global fund for education. The former archbishop of Cape Town, a Nobel Peace Prize winner (1984) and hero of the anti-apartheid movement, wants the money to encourage provision of a basic education for the 75 million children around the world who do not attend school. Let’s see if Barack Obama et al listen to the great man.
