Alison Kriel

Both her mum and aunts were all teachers, so although she didn’t always think she would be a teacher it was inevitable that she would find herself studying teaching at North London University.

Since then, Alison has worked in several schools, led two schools and has experienced all the education-related challenges and joys you can imagine. Alison set up a new school, turned around a failing school, supported a range of schools and educators and worked to transform the lives of thousands of children.

After completing her teacher training, Alison taught infant classes for three years before becoming a Year 6 teacher and maths coordinator at Gayhurst School in Hackney. After one year she was appointed as Deputy Headteacher.

Thanks to her work at Betty Layward, during 2008 Alison was asked to go to the Local Authority-managed Northwold School in Hackney to act as Executive Headteacher before a visit from Government school inspectors. The school was failing and had a high turnaround of leaders and teachers; with staffing attendance at just 64%.

Thanks to the hard work of Alison and her team, the school grew from failing in the bottom 1% of schools to a highly successful school in the top 0.1%.
One of the key reasons that the school was so successful was that they invested in staff wellbeing and, as a result, could recruit a talented team and sustain staffing attendance at 97% and above.