Meet the Speakers

Childcare & Education Expo Midlands

Our speakers will be sharing their years of knowledge, strategies and tactics in our exciting seminars and workshops on the 24th – 25th September! Take a look below to find out more about each of our experts and why you won’t want to miss seeing them in action.

Alice Sharp

Managing Director, Adventures with Alice

Alice Sharp’s Bio

I have been a primary teacher for 30 years, an associate of London Early Years Foundation, multi Award Winner within the Early Years Sector and the creator of over 200 specialist courses delivered all over the UK and around the Globe. I work with all four governments of the United Kingdom, am a senior lecturer for Early Years at Glasgow College, a guest Lecturer at University of Glasgow, University of Wales, University of Carmarthen and Queens University and an author and writer of books and publications.

Anneka Russell

Early Years Consultant, Enjoy EY

Anneka Russell’s Bio

Coming soon

Ann Marie Christian

International Safeguarding Consultant & Trainer

Ann Marie Christian’s Bio

Ann Marie is safeguarding practitioner and has been a qualified social worker since 1996. She has worked for various local authorities on the front line, in management, Local Safeguarding Children Board Trainer, LADO, Safeguarding advisor to schools, school improvement advisor, Designated Safeguarding Lead trainer and Designated Safeguarding Lead coordinator. She held half termly meetings with the DSL’s and shared updates, local themes and support at these meetings.

Arun Kanwar

Partner, Cairneagle

Arun Kanwar’s Bio

Arun, is a partner at Cairneagle, a global independent consulting firm that specialises in the education sector. Cairneagle has a strong passion for the childcare space and has been involved in every major nursery transaction in the UK in the last five years by supporting a number of corporates with their growth strategy. It also undertakes work in the early years sector internationally, including in North America, continental Europe and Asia.
Previously, Arun was at Bright Horizons, where he headed up the UK corporate development and had global strategy responsibilities. Over the course of 2020, Cairneagle wrote the LaingBuisson UK Childcare Market Report and founded a Childcare COVID Crisis Working Group to bring together operators to collaborate and influence policymakers.

Ben Kingston-Hughes

Managing Director, Inspired Children

Ben Kingston-Hughes Bio

Ben Kingston-Hughes is a national award-winning trainer and Managing Director of Inspired Children. He has worked with children for over 30 years and has twice appeared on television working with vulnerable children. His transformative training has been mentioned by Ofsted as an example of outstanding staff development and his distinctive blend of humour, neuroscience and real-life practical experiences make his training invaluable for anyone working with children. He is currently writing a book about the profound importance of play which will be published next year.

Cheryl Bedding

Director, Early Years Collective

Cheryl Bedding’s Bio

Cheryl has over 25 years experience within the childcare sector within a range of roles, starting as a nanny, onto social services family support, local authority advisor, early years lecturer, tutor, assessor, consultant and trainer.

Cheryl is now a director of Early Years Collective, an amazing new training and coaching platform that empowers parents and early years educators to navigate the journey of a child from pre-conception to school.

Cheryl’s passion is for quality practice for enabling environments and providing spaces that support and empower ALL children. She has delivered webinars on the subject as far reaching as Dubai, Saudi Arabia and Jamaica. Cheryl has 2 children with one who has additional needs, she shares her knowledge and experiences of children with Autism Spectrum Disorder and Sensory Processing Disorder.

Cheryl Hadland

Tops Day Nurseries

Cheryl Hadland’s Bio

Cheryl Hadland founded Tops Day Nurseries in 1990 after discovering a lack of suitable childcare in her area; Tops Day Nurseries now consists of 30 nurseries, which provide childcare for ages 0-15, driven by the ethos of creating a safe, caring, and sustainable environment, in which to educate our children and provide them with the best possible start for enjoying, learning and contributing as they mature.

Cheryl is an active Scuba Diver (instructing, cave diving and shark diving), loves walking her dog, and spending time with her family, children and grandchildren. Of course she’s a bit of an eco-warrior, caring deeply about the environment and actively doing what she can herself, through Tops and through GECCO, the charity she formed to share ideas on how we can provide a more sustainable environment and education for our children.

Cheryl is active politically on behalf of private day nurseries and early years teachers, and has won many awards in recent years for her work, such as being crowned the “Most Influential” person in the Early Years Sector in 2018, and has delivered Eco training for early years professionals at an International level. She is currently also a doctoral student in Sustainable Leadership.

Professor Christine Pascal OBE

Director, Centre for Research in Early Childhood (CREC)

Christine Pascal’s Bio

Professor Christine Pascal OBE is Director of Centre for Research in Early Childhood (CREC), based at the St Thomas Children’s Centre in Birmingham and, co-director of Amber Publications & Training with Professor Tony Bertram. She holds professorships with the University of Wolverhampton and Birmingham City University. She is a Founder and President of the European Early Childhood Education Research Association and a Vice President of Early Education. Since 2000 she has been an Early Years Specialist Adviser to the House of Commons Select Committee on Education. She has researched and written extensively on the policy and practice of early childhood education and development and the quality of early education services. She is currently leading mixed method research and evaluation projects for the Scouting Movement, Early Education, the States of Jersey, Birmingham City, UK and Oporto, Portugal, and Staffordshire and Stoke on Trent LA’s. She was awarded an OBE in 2001 and a Nursery World Lifetime Achievement Award in 2012. drchrispascal@crec.co.uk

Clare Roberts

CEO, Kids Planet & Kids Allowed

Clare Roberts Bio

Clare is the CEO of Kids Planet and Kids Allowed, founding Kids Planet in 2008 with her father; John Hoban. The company has since grown to 54 settings across the North West and Midlands. They are responsible for the care of over 8000 children and over 2000 staff. The business has been supported by investment from BGF since 2016.

Over the last 13 years Kids Planet has become a leading early years provider across the UK.
In 2020 Kids Planet was named number 1 for Quality of Childcare in the UK, and the UK’s third largest group.

Emma Pinnock

SEND Consultant, Essential Education Group

Emma Pinnock’s Bio

As an educator Emma has had a rich and varied career.
She has been a teacher for 14 years, working in a range of environments such as PRU’s, Hospital schools, Special schools and Mainstream education.
Emma has also been in a range of senior management roles for 8 years and in her most recent role, as the Head of a specialist provision, focused on the needs and education of children with autism.
Emma’s passion to support SEND has derived from her personal Journey. This has led to her belief in people’s abilities to overcome barriers and difficulties.
Emma is solution focused, strategic and has the ability to develop vision for schools, organisations and families. Emma has both personal and professional experience of living with special educational needs which uniquely impacts her ability and insights. She strives to encourage people to see past their comfort zones, to be solution focused despite the difficulties and to stretch themselves past the norm.

Dr John Siraj-Blatchford

Co-Director, SchemaPlay

Dr John Siraj-Blatchford’s Bio

Dr John Siraj-Blatchford is co-director of SchemaPlay providing training for trainers in support of the OMEP-UK Early Childhood Education for Sustainable Citizenship Award. John is an Honorary Professor at the University of Plymouth, and was previously employed at the University of Cambridge Faculty of Education. He has researched and written widely on the subject of Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) and Early Childhood Science and Design and Technology Education. His work with the Organisation Mondiale pour l’Education Préscolaire contributed to the UN Decade of ESD, and it continues in the promotion and delivery of the UNESCO 2030 ESD RoadMap.

Dr Mine Conkbayir

Award-Winning Author, Trainer and Early Years Consultant

Dr Mine Conkbayir’s Bio

Coming soon

June O’Sullivan, MBE

Chief Executive, London Early Years Foundation

June O’Sullivan’s Bio

As CEO and creator of the UK’s leading childcare social enterprise, June continues to break new ground in the development of LEYF’s scalable social business model. She remains a tireless campaigner, looking for new ways to influence policy and make society a better place for all children and families.

June has developed the LEYF Pedagogy and champions of community-based, multi-generational early years education as the basis for greater social and cultural capital to deliver long-term social impact. She continues to advise Governments as well as a range of organisations, academics and services at home and overseas about how best to implement a social enterprise vision for Early Years.

June is a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, Director of Social Enterprise UK, Trustee of The Book Trust, and Member of the London Mayor’s Child Obesity Taskforce. June was awarded an MBE in the Queen’s Birthday honours in 2013, for her services to London’s children. In 2017 she was delighted to receive the Most Influential Person In Early Years Award and joined the top 10 of the WISE100 – an initiative from the NatWest SE100 Index which recognises100 of the most inspiring and influential women in social enterprise, impact investment and social innovation.

Kim Esnard

The Early Years Collective

Kim Esnard’s Bio

With over 25 years experience in the Early Years Sector, Kim’s experience covers a range of roles including running her own successful childcare business that achieved two consecutive “Outstanding” Ofsted grades. She has worked with Early Education, been a Pacey Local Peer to Peer trainer, an LA Independent Trainer and Vice Chair of her local Childminders Association.

Kim is a Director at The Early Years Collective – born out of a vision she has long held to see the whole journey of the child from conception to those early school years. Her mission is to encourage, equip and empower the child, the parent and the educator to enjoy, understand and navigate this incredible journey of childhood and by doing so, reaching their full potential.

Kim’s passion is for outstanding practice that celebrates the child and the educator. Through creative curriculums, exhilarating experiences and thriving work environments we build the next inspirational generation of children who are equipped for modern life.

Michael Freeston

Director, Early Years Alliance

Michael Freeston’s Bio

Coming Soon

Mike Abbott

Operations Director, London Early Years Foundation

Mike Abbott’s Bio

Mike has been in Early Years for over 8 years following a long career in retail. He led the Co-operative childcare as it grew from a regional provider with 6 settings to a national provider with 50 nurseries, all of which were rated good or Outstanding. Just over 3 years ago Mike joined June O’Sullivan at London Early Years Foundation as Director of Operations, responsible for delivering profitable high quality, socially responsible provision in the 42 settings across 12 Boroughs in London. Over half of the nurseries are currently rated as Outstanding and many nurseries operate in areas of deprivation.

Phil Minns

HMI and Specialist Adviser, Early Years and Primary Education Ofsted

Phil Minns’s Bio

Phil Minns is one of Her Majesty’s Inspectors and is the specialist advisor for Early Years and Primary education. As part of the policy team at Ofsted, Phil has been involved in the development of the new inspection framework for both schools and the early years regulatory sector.

Phil has a great deal of experience in primary and early education. He trained and worked as a teacher in the early years before going on to be a head teacher for fourteen years in three schools. He has been Assistant Director of Children’s Services with responsibility for education, SEND and Early Years. Phil also spent time as the CEO of a multi-academy trust containing primary, secondary and special schools.

Phil was a National Leader of Education before becoming one of Her Majesty’s School Inspectors following a yearlong secondment to Ofsted.

Purnima Tanuku OBE

Chief Executive, NDNA

Purnima Tanuku’s Bio

Purnima, supported by the Board of Trustees, leads the strategic direction of NDNA. She has developed NDNA into the Voice of the Sector, the strongest and biggest representative organisation for early years across the UK. Purnima negotiates with Government Ministers and parliamentarians, civil servants and local authorities. She regularly appears on national television, radio, online and print media sharing the views of our nursery members, raising public awareness and lobbying Government for better support for nurseries and their children.

Since joining NDNA, Purnima has developed the organisation’s infrastructure to support and represent the membership across the UK. She was instrumental in developing NDNA’s National Early Years Enterprise Centre at its headquarters in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire. Purnima has a wealth of experience at senior executive level working with public, private and charitable organisations. In 2010 Purnima was awarded OBE for services to families.

Sarah Mackenzie

Chief Education & People Officer, N Family Club

Sarah Mackenzie’s Bio

Coming soon

Sejal Payne

An Independent Education Consultant

Sejal Payne’s Bio

Sejal Payne is an independent education consultant , advisor and trainer based in Milton Keynes and works locally, nationally as well as internationally. She has over two decades of experience of working in the Early Years, Primary and Secondary sector. She specialises in Equalities, Inclusion, Ethnic Minority Achievement, English as an Additional Language, as well as language development. She has recently formed a training partnership – S&S Training Partners, offering bespoke training to the Early Years sector. She is an accredited trainer for talkingpartners@primary, talking maths and boosting reading@ primary and secondary intervention. She supports teacher training and development through her collaborations with numerous agencies including Tommy Flowers SCITT, PEP:mk , British Schools in the Middle East . As an accredited trainer for bespoke parenting modules, she also delivers to target communities through schools , Children’s Centres and community groups. In her spare time, she volunteers as a governor for the Middle East Language supplementary school and a nursery school in Milton Keynes.

Shaddai Tembo

Lecturer, Perth College UHI, Early Years Writer and Speaker

Shaddai Tembo’s Bio

Shaddai Tembo is a Lecturer in Early Education & Childhood Practice at Perth College UHI and a Postgraduate Research Student at the University of the West of Scotland. His research focuses on the role of alternative outdoor early childhood provision in Scotland, exploring how children’s subjectivities are (in)formed within such spaces. Shaddai started off as an early years practitioner and family support worker for a children’s centre in central Bristol. He previously directed the Bristol Men in Early Years Network, is part of the steering group for the ESRC funded study ‘Gender Diversification in Early Years Education’ (GenderEYE.org), and the MITEYUK.org project. Shaddai is also a trustee for Early Education, co-convenes the SERA Early Years Network and (occasionally) writes independently at CriticalEarlyYears.org. You can follow him on Twitter @CriticalEYears.