ABSTRACT
Closing the attainment gap in schools can only be achieved through people – dedicated people. Such a dedicated person is Lee Hessey, CEO of The Forge Trust. Encompassing former mining villages and towns of the East Midlands this Multi-Academy Trust lives up to its motto – Labor Omnia Vincit – ‘work conquers everything’. As the driving force behind this Trust, Lee speaks of talent, standards, curriculum and research as four of the key areas contributing to their successes. The Forge Trust invests in talent – its people – through paying for MA courses and sponsoring its Head of Teaching and Learning to qualify successfully in England’s first cohort of Chartered Teachers. A deliberate reduction in class sizes is one of the key features underpinning the sustained improvement in standards of pupil attainment. There is a like-mindedness and a collective will amongst the teaching staff to drive up standards through a continuous improvement of the curriculum; and their pedagogy is underpinned by a willingness to undertake research. It was through listening to Lee in conversation that I became involved with schools sited in areas of deprivation – and so, in this opening chapter, we listen to Lee, a National Leader of Education working in the top performing school in Newark.
