2025 highlights

Mark’s work in education is rooted in his belief that schools and other settings have the potential to break historic cycles of social disadvantage and to prevent the marginalisation of vulnerable young people. Mark has been a headteacher of a secondary school, an Ofsted inspector and a founding trustee of the PSHE Association before he established Olive Academies Trust in 2015.

Through the work of Olive Academies, Mark has been invited to join a small number of external advisory boards and forums, where insight, innovation, and best practices are shared to help form a collective voice that will impact more children and young people nationally. Mark is Chair of The National MAT CEO Network for Alternative Provision and SEND, a member of the DfE’s SEND and AP Improvement Board, Co-chair of Ofsted’s Inclusion Reference Group and Independent Chair of Norfolk County Council’s Executive Board. An advocate for partnership working, Mark regards collaboration as an effective and necessary route to improving the life chances of more of the most vulnerable children in the country.

In 2021 Mark was awarded an MBE in The Queen’s New Year Honours List for his services to children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities.

Jon Yates is the founding CEO of the Youth Endowment Fund (YEF). The YEF is a £200 million endowment focused on reducing violence. In this role Jon advises government, schools, colleges, police forces, youth charities and the youth justice system on what works to keep young people safe.

Jon has worked across the youth, education and community cohesion sectors. He is an experienced founder and leader including of the UK’s National Citizen Service, which became the fastest growing youth movement since the Scouts. He is the author of ‘Fractured: How we live together’ and previously served in government as the lead adviser to the UK’s Education Secretary on technical education, schools, nurseries, colleges and university policy. Jon sits on the boards of Ofsted, the Children’s Commissioner and UK Youth.

Hilary is the CEO of Ambition Institute, and has previously held senior roles in education policy, professional development, and equalities. As a charity, Ambition Institute’s focus is on tackling educational inequality. Since March 2019, Ambition has worked with over 100,000 teachers, and with more than half of all schools in the country. The organisation supports teachers and leaders across their careers with high quality, evidence-based professional development, from initial teacher training to trust leadership. As well as a wide range of professional development programmes, Ambition delivers innovative pilot initiatives, a portfolio of robust research, and wider sector engagement to support equality. SEND and inclusion are long-standing priorities for Ambition, and the team is pleased to have worked with CST on publications like Five principles for inclusion, and convening the Inclusion in Practice hub.