Speakers | HMC Autumn Conference 2025

Philip Britton is the Head of Foundation at Bolton School, a school for some 2,400 pupils from nursery to Sixth Form, with a Boys’ Division, Girls’ Division and Primary Division structure. He took on this newly developed overarching role in 2021 having been Head of the Boys’ Division at Bolton since 2008. He was brought up on Tyneside and was educated at Blaydon Comprehensive School, took a first in physics at Oxford and did teacher training at Cambridge, winning the Charles Fox prize. He worked as physics teacher, Head of Physics and Deputy Head (Academic) at Leeds Grammar School. Between 2005 and 2008 he worked between Leeds Girls’ High School and Leeds Grammar School as the two merged into the Grammar School at Leeds.

Philip has been very much involved in the Institute of Physics over the years, chairing their Yorkshire Branch, the Education Committee and being a trustee and the national Vice President for Education for four years from 2012-16. In 2010 he was awarded an MBE for services to physics and is a Fellow of the Institute of Physics where he remains much involved in physics education, encouraging teachers to inspire the next generation of physicists.

Philip was a member of the HMC Communications Committee from 2012 to 2024 and has been the Chair for many years, as well as serving a term as Secretary and Chair of the North West Division. He is very much committed to the purpose of HMC as a mutually supportive group of colleagues with common aims as well as a means for providing a public voice to issues that our sector cares about. The capacity and expertise for communication within HMC and communications from HMC to the wider world has been transformed in the last decade. Philip is very much committed to articulating the moral purpose of our schools and their place in the educational landscape, so often based on our very real sense of place in our localities more than the national debates. We know the positive difference we make to our pupils and the impact we have on the areas around our schools. He is passionate about schools being inclusive, promoting social mobility, fundraising and bursary support: to that end he has been a trustee of the Institute of Development Professionals in Education since 2018 and Chair of Trustees from 2021 to 2024. Aside from this he volunteers time as a Governor: from 2012-2019 he was a Governor at Stockport Grammar school, chairing the education Committee and from 2022 has been a Governor at the Grammar School at Leeds, where he is Chair of the Foundation Committee and a member of the Education Committee. He also volunteers time to the Scout movement, of which he has been a member from childhood and is currently the Assistant Group Scout Leader for the school group.

Nicola Smith is Joint Principal of Chetham’s School of Music in Manchester leading on academic, pastoral and boarding care for students. Her current specialism is safeguarding but has enjoyed much of her working career in inner city schools as a Drama teacher in vibrant Performing Arts Departments before moving to Chetham’s seven years ago.

Tom Redmond is Joint Principal and Director of Music of Chetham’s School of Music in Manchester. As a horn player he has performed throughout the world and was a member of the Hallé orchestra for 13 years. Tom devises and presents interactive family-friendly concerts for orchestras and festivals and  was a regular voice on BBC Radio 3 presenting live concerts, studio programmes and the BBC proms.

Sir Ernest became Master of Pembroke College, Oxford, in July 2020. His previous role was in the United Kingdom Judiciary, as Senior President of Tribunals and a Lord Justice of Appeal.  He is the legal adviser to the House of Commons Privileges Committee and Committee on Standards. He has published and lectured internationally on issues of family law, the role of a modern judiciary, the leadership and governance of justice, and cultural conflicts in justice. He is a Senior Associate at the University of Oxford’s Centre for Socio-Legal Studies, Chair of the Conference of Colleges Legal Panel and deputy chair of its Governance Forum.  Sir Ernest is a Deputy Lieutenant and a trustee and deputy chair of the Nuffield Foundation and of the Charities Aid Foundation. He is an Honorary Professor of the Universities of Lancaster and Bolton and the Chancellor Emeritus of the University of Bolton.

Ali Henderson has been the Chief Executive of Royal National Children’s Springboard Foundation (RNCSF) – the UK’s largest bursary charity – since March 2020, having previously led their approach to impact and learning since late 2018. A graduate in Economics from the University of Cambridge, she has twenty years of experience of leading programmes and policies to address social inequality across roles in national charities, central and local government.

Adam is co-head of EMEA Foreign Exchange (FX) Sales and head of Global FX Hedge Fund Coverage and EMEA FICC Hedge Fund Coverage, respectively. He is a co-sponsor of the EMEA Veterans Network, a program sponsor of the Veterans Integration Program in EMEA, a managing director ally of the LGBTQ+ Network, co sponsor of EMEA Global Banking & Markets Culture and Conduct and a member of the EMEA Inclusion and Diversity Committee and Firmwide Client Franchise Committee.
Adam joined Goldman Sachs as a vice president in 2008 and was named managing director in 2013 and partner in 2020. Adam previously served as an infantry officer in the British Army. Adam earned an MA, with honors, from the University of Edinburgh and an MBA from London Business School.

Dr. Jim Heal is a leading advocate for bridging the worlds of research and practice in education. His work seeks to develop expertise in evidence-informed instruction and leadership in K-12 schools, school districts, and higher education in the United States and Europe. Dr. Heal was a high school English teacher and principal for ten years in the UK before moving to the US, where he became Director of Practice at Harvard’s Research Schools International program. In his work at Deans for Impact, a US-based non-profit, he strives to increase teacher effectiveness by infusing the science of learning into educator preparation. He currently serves as Professor of Evidence-Informed Education Leadership at Academica University of Applied Sciences in Amsterdam, and teaches at the Harvard Graduate School of Education where he earned his doctorate in educational leadership. He is author of How Teaching Happens: Seminal Works in Teaching and Teacher Effectiveness and What They Mean in Practice, and Mental Models: How Understanding the Mind Can Transform the Way You Work and Learn.

Sue has been Principal of The Grammar School at Leeds since April 2016, having been Principal of the British School of Brussels for five years prior to that. Sue always wanted to teach and, after graduating from Liverpool in English, she studied for her PGCE at Durham, with the NPQH from the IoE and MEd from Buckingham following later. She began her career in the North East, the place of her birth, at Westfield School in Newcastle. She was then approached to join the founding staff at Emmanuel College in Gateshead, one of eight City Technology Colleges established by the government in the late 1980s, where she set up the library and was second in the English department before becoming Head of Year. From there, Sue moved to Sutton Grammar School for Boys where she became Head of Key Stage Three, moving to The Holy Trinity CE School as Deputy Head Pastoral in 1998. The family move to Brussels saw Sue appointed to The British School of Brussels, first as a Deputy Head Academic, before moving to Vice Principal and Head of Senior School and then, in 2011, to Principal. Sue is an experienced school governor, involved in several Leeds partnership projects and has served in various roles in the churches she has attended. She was also involved in national politics in her youth and still maintains an (unhealthy?) interest. More edifying – she is an avid reader and loves the theatre, from the toughest dramas to grand opera. She is married to Martin, has two adult children and is also a doting grandma.

Leigh Webb is CEO of ISC Research, the world’s leading provider of data, intelligence and research expertise on the international schools market.
Educated at Charterhouse and Durham University, Leigh was an equity analyst in the City of London for four years. Since then, his business career has encompassed retail, sport and distribution. Leigh joined ISC Research as CEO in 2016 to lead the company during a period of substantial investment and development within the international schools market.
ISC Research has tracked the world’s English-medium international schools market since 1994 providing market data and intelligence, identifying development opportunities and facilitating school/investor partnerships. It is a trusted research partner for schools, investors, education suppliers and sector specialists.

Mark S. Steed has spent the past 23 years leading top UK independent school; and international schools in Dubai and Hong Kong.

He now runs Steed Education (steededucation.com), an international educational consultancy committed to supporting school leaders. Steed Education provides project management services for key strategic initiatives, such as school mergers, opening new campuses and developing digital strategy; as well as undertaking IT and cyber-risk audits and implementation programmes. As part of this work, he is currently working as the Interim Principal and CEO of Stamford School in Lincolnshire

Mark worked in the UK as a Teacher, Head of Department, and Boarding Housemaster prior to his two senior leaderships roles as Headmaster of Kelly College in Devon; and then as Principal of the Berkhamsted Schools Group. He moved aboard in September 2015 to be Director of JESS, Dubai, before moving to Hong Kong in September 2019 to be the Principal and CEO of Kellett School.

Mark has degrees from Cambridge and Nottingham Universities and from Ashridge-Hult Business School where he researched ‘Alternative Business models for Secondary Schooling’. He has a particular interest in how new technologies can be used in education and chaired the UK Independent Schools Council Digital Strategy Group from 2007 to 2015. He recently completed the Harvard course on Cybersecurity: Managing Risk in the Information Age.

Mark writes about international education and a range of other educational and IT issues. He is active on his LinkedIn page https://www.linkedin.com/in/independenthead.