Additional Learning Needs (ALN) Reform Wales Digital Conference ON DEMAND

Karen is the policy officer for ALN and poverty at Children in Wales. As the national umbrella body for organisations and individuals who work with children, young people and their families, Children in Wales works closely with Welsh Government and others to ensure that children’s rights are at the forefront of policy and decision making.
Karen also chairs and facilitates TSANA (Third Sector Additional Needs Alliance). TSANA is a coalition of third sector organisation working with, supporting and representing a broad range of children and young people with additional learning needs. We believe in equity and parity of education and work to improve the outcomes and opportunities for children and young people with additional learning needs, ensuring they are valued, empowered, respected and represented.
TSANA believes that all children and young people, regardless of their abilities, educational needs or circumstances should be able to realise their rights under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.

Hannah currently leads the Support for Learners Division within the Welsh Government’s Education Directorate. She is committed to delivering programmes that improve outcomes for people in Wales. She is passionate about advancing policies aimed at fostering inclusive education, drawing on her extensive expertise in putting equality and human rights at the heart of policy and practice.
Hannah strives to adopt a compassionate, creative and collaborative leadership style, which she has successfully applied to previous high-impact roles for the EHRC, the Welsh Refugee Council, UN Women and organisations dedicated to preventing violence against women.
Hannah has Kentish roots but chose to raise her family and grow her community in Wales.

Teleri Llwyd-Jones has been Headteacher at Ysgol Borthyn Voluntary Controlled, Church in Wales school for eight years and had been a Headteacher at two different schools previous.

The school is in the town of Ruthin, Denbighshire and majority of pupils come from the local area. The school provides education for approximately 100 pupils aged from three to eleven.

Her vision for the future is to ensure that every learner reaches their full potential and develops into ambitious lifelong learners, who are ready to be valued citizens of Wales and the world.
Through engaging learning experiences, the school nurtures confidence, curiosity and creativity and promotes bilingualism, wellbeing, sustainability and especially aspiration, in an inclusive Christian environment. The school celebrates learner’s achievement and encourages them to BELIEVE, ASPIRE, TRY and SUCCEED. The number of pupils eligible for free school meals is 38%.

At Ysgol Borthyn, we predominantly teach through the medium of English but with significant use of the Welsh Language.

Margaret Davies is the headteacher of St Christopher’s Special School in Wrexham. St Christopher’s School is a large maintained special school for children and young people aged 6-19 years old with a range of additional learning needs. There are 285 pupils on role and they are supported by a large and diverse staff team which include, teachers, support staff, tutors and on-site therapists.

Margaret has cross a range of educational sectors, both Welsh and English medium. She started her career at Ysgol Plasmawr in Cardiff and became a head of department in the school. She then went on to lead the Pupil Referral Unit and Behaviour Support Service in Ceredigion. Margaret has also worked as a HMI, working across a range of sectors including local authority, special and independent. Prior to her present role, Margaret was seconded to be the ALN Transformation Lead for North Wales supporting the implementation of the ALNET Act 2018.

Margaret believes strongly in equality, inclusion and wellbeing and has developed a team approach to supporting these elements at St Christopher’s School. She has a strong track record of developing staff and has a strong delegated leadership structure through the school.

Simon was appointed as Principal and Chief Executive of Bridgend College in June 2013 and has worked in the education sector for over thirty years. This includes work in the Higher Education (HE), Further Education (FE) and School sectors and a year long Fulbright Scholarship where he worked as a Head of Department in Los Angeles.

Simon won the 2018 Institute of Directors (UK) Director of the Year for the Public Sector and was awarded an OBE in the 2020 New Years Honours list for his services to FE and HE.

Simon has held a number of Board memberships including Sports Wales, National Theatre of Wales, Academi Wales’ Advisory Board, Ystradgynlais Miners Welfare Hall and was the Deputy Chair of ColegauCymru and Chair of the Active Wellbeing subgroup until late-2022. Simon is currently a member of Bridgend County Borough Council’s Public Service Board.

Siân Lewis is Head of Parent Participation at Parentkind. Parentkind exists to empower all with parental or educational responsibility to improve the life chances of children, young people, and their communities. Parentkind are the network of PTA fundraisers across England, Wales and Northern Ireland, representing parent voice and championing the role of parents in education, working with schools, parents and policy makers to support every child to thrive and reach their potential. Sian’s focus, through a suite of training, tools, information, advice, surveys, partnerships and resources, is to support schools to embed effective parental participation and parents to be involved and engaged in education and school life.

Hannah Jones is a managing director of Rachael’s Playhouse and Blossom Early Years. She has been working in Early Years for 13 years. Starting off as a co-childminder working from home. She has a honours degree in Early Years and Education
Hannah has taken part in a number of pilot projects for the local authority and has shared her excellent practice to maintained and non-maintained education settings across Wales. She has spoken on many public platforms about the transition to the new Curriculum For Wales.
Hannah has been praised for her work with children with emerging needs. She ensures that her settings offer a universal approach to supporting all children and is passionate about her teams being highly trained and educated so that they are confident and competent within their roles to support the children.
Hannah believes that all children are born with innate talents, and establishing strong relationships in educational settings is fundamental to children reaching their full potential.

Sarah Sutton is the Headteacher of Ysgol Eirias, a large secondary school in Colwyn Bay. Ysgol Eirias is a highly successful school, catering for a diverse range of learners of all abilities and backgrounds. With over fifteen years of experience in Senior Leadership and Headship, Sarah has a wealth of experience in Leadership, ALN and Inclusion and equitable Teaching and Learning.

Sarah is Estyn Peer Inspector trained and fulfils a Supporting Improvement Advisory role in the GwE regional consortia. Frequently drawn upon to provide expert input to school improvement, Sarah has provided advice and support in a number of multi stakeholder forums.

At the heart of Sarah’s educational ideology is a desire to nurture every learner; creating the conditions for growth with the very best learning and teaching as a central tenet.

Sam is a renowned speaker, trainer and author specialising in mental health and inclusion. She has been a SENCo in a large secondary school, is a qualified mental health professional and coach . Sam also set up a company providing mental health CBT programmes for schools. She is in high demand to speak at conferences and events and provides in-house training for schools and companies, nationally and internationally. Lauded for her humour and ‘telling it like it is’ approach to mental health, Sam has had her book Mental Health in Education published by Routledge, and regularly writes for several publications with more books in the pipeline for publication.

Amanda has over 25 years of working with Children and Young People. Working across sectors including health, education and social care consolidated her passion for holistic and collaborative practice when working with families. Currently working as Head of Occupational Therapy (OT) for Children and Young People (C&YP) at Swansea Bay University Health Board (SBUHB). Amanda had been Vice chair of Royal College of Occupational Therapy (RCOT welsh board) and had opportunities to present at national conferences alongside representing her dynamic team when receiving the ‘overall winner’ at Allied Health Awards AHA (Wales) awards in 2019 and runner up at AHA (UK) awards in 2020, for leading, improved and sustained changes to Occupational Therapy service delivery for CYP.
Amanda is passionate about inclusion and committed to collaboratively embedding Occupational therapy to ensure inclusive learning environments and person centred practice.

With 20 years NHS experience as a Speech and Language Therapist, I am passionate about ensuring children and young people achieve their communication and swallowing potential. I have worked across a variety of health sectors, and am currently the Head of Paediatric Speech & Language Therapy in Swansea Bay University Health Board. With a dynamic and inspiring team, alongside fantastic beaches, Swansea really is an exciting place to work. I am committed to working closely with Local Authority colleagues to implement ALN to a high standard, ensuring that what is important to, and for, a child underpins key decision making around that child’s support and health provision. Taking a Care Aims approach to providing each child with an inclusive learning environment is fundamental to successful communication outcomes for every child. This can only be achieved through robust and sustainable collaboration.

Nanna returned to higher education later on in life after raising a family and worked as a Teaching Assistant and a primary school teacher in Ceredigion.  She was appointed as a lecturer to the School of Education Studies and Social Inclusion at UWTSD in 2008 and in 2010 received a Welsh medium fellowship to develop Additional Learning Needs (ALN) provision through the medium of Welsh within the Faculty of Education and Training. In 2013 she was appointed as senior lecturer with responsibility for leading ALN across the Initial Teacher Education courses.  Her research interests include dyslexia, autism and children’s well-being, and her current doctoral thesis focuses on learners and practitioners perceptions of social and emotional well-being.  She has also published through the medium of Welsh, including a range of resources for learners with ALN.  In her current role, she teaches on undergraduate and postgraduate courses in teacher education and works on several Welsh Government funded projects.

I live in Carmarthenshire with my husband and have two grown up boys who both live in Aberystwyth. I am a fluent Welsh speaker. I have been in education since 1996; firstly as a mainstream teacher (French, German and Welsh) before moving to be the Teacher-in-Charge of a Welsh medium secondary ASD/SLD provision in 2005. In 2017, I made the move and joined the Local Authority Inclusion Team as the Advisory Teacher for Speech, Language and Communication working closely with Hywel Dda Health Board Speech and Language Therapy Team. More recently I have been promoted to part time Assistant ALN Manager for Provision for two days as well as keeping my original role. My roles include supporting schools with pupils who have speech, language and communication needs as well as chairing the monthly Communication Forum where all referrals are discussed. As Assistant Manager for Provision I work closely with all specialist settings and am leading on ALN transformation and the preparing of Individual development Plans in our Specialist Settings.

I live in Swansea with my husband, and twin sons. I have been teaching for 20 years. I joined St Helen’s Primary as an NQT and have worked there ever since.  I became the ALNCO in 2008. St Helen’s Primary have a team approach to everything and as a result we have developed various strategies, policies, and procedures to support staff, pupils, and parents and created one big team that works together for the good of the children. In our last Estyn inspection in May 2016 we were asked to write a best practice case study on helping pupils with additional learning needs reach their potential. Since then, we have worked on developing targets, provision, person centred reviews and more recently implementing the changes for the ALNET bill and managing the increasing level of need in school post COVID, changing our facilities and working practices to ensure they are as inclusive as possible.

St Helen’s Primary is a wonderful place to work and I am so very grateful to all the staff for all their hard work and dedication.

Gareth started his teaching career in Leicestershire and moved to Wales in 1999, following his heart and the Llanelli Scarlets.  His career pathway in ALN began in RCT & Merthyr Local Authorities pioneering education support for children looked after.  This led to closer working relationships with Children’s services where Gareth developed projects to improve fostering recruitment and training.

Gareth went back to teaching in 2015, working in both Special Schools and in an advisory capacity  specifically working with Children with complex needs and autism.  Recently Gareth has returned to working in local Government leading on preventative services and ALN transformation in Pembrokeshire and at the beginning of 2023 moving to Torfaen Council as Head of ALN, Inclusion and Wellbeing.

Stephen was a late entrant into social care and local government having trained as an Engineer. At the start of his career, he worked in several different roles and industries including managing several hospitality businesses, plus stints in retail and the consultancy sectors.

Stephen was drawn into local government for very personal reasons due to the care of a close family member, which was unfortunately so inadequate that it compelled him to embark on a new career in Social Care. Specialising in mental health, mental capacity and safeguarding as a Social Worker, he quickly moved into management roles and became the Director of Adults and Communities in Herefordshire before joining Torfaen Council in July 2021.

Carmel Conn is Associate Professor of Inclusive Pedagogy at the University of South Wales. Her experience is in the area of inclusive education and disability having worked for over twenty years as a classroom practitioner, SENCo and specialist teacher. As a researcher, Carmel aims to contribute to the improvement of the education and well-being of children and young people and has carried out large-scale evaluations and smaller scale projects focused on learning support for educational inclusion. Recent projects include grouping practices used with lower attaining students and reform of the system for additional learning needs. Carmel has published numerous articles and books, most recently co-editing the book Inclusive Pedagogies for Early Childhood Education: Respecting and Responding to Differences in Learning (Routledge).

I came in to post as the Designated Education Clinical Lead Officer for BCUHB in January 2023. My role is to support the co-ordination of the Health Boards’ functions in relation to children and young people with Additional Learning Needs.
Prior to the DECLO role, I was Head of Speech and Language Therapy for the Conwy and Denbighshire Areas of North Wales within BCUHB. My role as a Speech and Language Therapist spanned 23 years, the majority of which involved working collaboratively with schools and education teams to jointly develop services and initiatives for the benefit of children and young people with speech, language and communication needs. Collaborative working has played a central role throughout all aspects of my career as a Speech and Language Therapist, manager and leader within health services.

Karen is the policy officer for ALN and poverty at Children in Wales. As the national umbrella body for organisations and individuals who work with children, young people and their families, Children in Wales works closely with Welsh Government and others to ensure that children’s rights are at the forefront of policy and decision making.
Karen also chairs and facilitates TSANA (Third Sector Additional Needs Alliance). TSANA is a coalition of third sector organisation working with, supporting and representing a broad range of children and young people with additional learning needs. We believe in equity and parity of education and work to improve the outcomes and opportunities for children and young people with additional learning needs, ensuring they are valued, empowered, respected and represented.
TSANA believes that all children and young people, regardless of their abilities, educational needs or circumstances should be able to realise their rights under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.