Trustees

The Chair of Trustees for Aspire Schools is Mark Shaw. To contact him please email m.shaw@aspireap.org.uk or write to him at: The Wycombe Grange, 56 Amersham Hill, High Wycombe, Bucks, HP13 6PQ. 

For trustees' attendance, please click here. 
For Terms of Reference, please click here.
The Register of Pecuniary Interests can be found on the Governance page.

Trustees

Mark Shaw - Chair of Trustees

Mark Shaw is an experienced PR professional having worked professionally for the Conservative Party for 24 years before becoming a consultant to centre right political parties in emerging democracies across the world. He has worked throughout Africa, former the Russian states, the Caribbean and former the Balkan states.

From 2013-21 he was a senior Councillor in Buckinghamshire and was the former Cabinet member for Transportation in the Buckinghamshire County Council, where he dealt with reorganisation of the Portfolio, as well as crisis management on almost a daily basis. He was also Deputy Leader of the Council. He was, during that period, a regular contributor to both local, national and international media. He then became Portfolio holder for Children’s Services in the new Unitary Buckinghamshire Council. 

Mark graduated from Kingston University in Business Studies and has developed a lifelong interest in education. He has been a School Governor at several local schools in Chesham over the last 24 years, and is currently our Chair of Trustees, as well as the Chair of Governors of Newtown School. 

​Geralyn Wilson - Vice Chair of Trustees

A trustee and board member for Aspire for over 12 years, Geralyn Wilson spent 14 years as Headteacher at Great Marlow School. Her whole career has been dedicated to the education and development of young people, having served as a teacher and senior leader at schools across the Midlands and London. She is a board member and trustee for the ASCL - the professional association for school leaders; is  a course leader on the school improvement team for the Ambition Institute and is the Education Coach on the school improvement team for Teaching Times.

Luke Baker - Chair of Finance Committee

Luke Baker is a chartered accountant with over a decade of commercial experience. He has worked internationally across many sectors. Luke has served in a range of roles within his “big four” audit firm, and works on Public Interest Entity audits of some the UK’s largest corporations. In addition to being a trustee, he also chairs the finance committee.

Matthew Abbott

Matthew Abbott is Headteacher at Waddesdon CE School, an Outstanding secondary school in north Buckinghamshire.  He has served in education for over 25 years in a variety of settings.  He is currently a Delivery Lead on the National Professional Qualification for Headteachers and also holds a Trustee position with the Diocese of Oxford.  His particular interests relate to School Culture and Ethos, Quality of Education, and education for the whole child – in the present and for the future.

Rachel Addy

Rachel began her career as a fashion product developer living and working in China before returning to the Uk to settle as a Design and Technology teacher, specialising in Fashion Textiles. Rachel has supported her current school in achieving Eco School status and takes a proactive approach in environmental collaborations. Rachel has joined the board of trustees hoping to bring a fresh industry based perspective whilst understanding the fundamentals of education, with a vested interest in careers.

Ashley Bradshaw

Ashley is currently working as Head of English for Aspire, and has worked for Aspire for 10 years. Ashley is originally from Canada and graduated with an Honours Degree in French and a Bachelor of Education at a beautiful university in Thunder Bay called Lakehead University.  Initially, she started working in London at a variety of different schools, but eventually found her calling working part time at an ASD school, and a PRU as well. Ashley has done lots of work with the PTI to ensure that Aspire gets their annual mark, and has passed the NPQLT in 2022/2023. In her spare time, you can find Ashley playing softball and baseball and she is a part of the first ever Women's League national winners team in the world.

Garret Fay

Garret is CEO of a Multi Academy Trust in Buckinghamshire and a former Headteacher. He originally trained as a Drama Teacher and went on to become Head of Media and Film Studies, Head of Faculty for Creative Arts, Deputy Director of a Training School and Deputy Headteacher in charge of Teaching and Learning. Throughout his career, Garret has also been a visiting Lecturer at the University of Bedfordshire. Alongside his roles as CEO and Trustee of Aspire Schools, Garret sits as Lead Headteacher Ambassador for the Youth Sports Trust.

Sharon Jarrett

As the Headteacher at Amersham School in Buckinghamshire, Sharon has immersed herself in the process of improving the life chances of children and young people, through providing a first class educational experience, for the past 40 years.   She has been a teacher, subject leader, Head of sixth form, Assistant Headteacher and Deputy Headteacher,  in addition to being the Headteacher of Amersham School for the past 17 years.  Sharon has been described as both an inspirational and infectious leader and puts this down to the fact that she is employed in her ‘dream job.’  She passionately believes in equality and equity, and strongly believes that with determination, hard work and appropriate support, any young person can achieve anything that they aspire to.

Members

Elizabeth Hutton

Liz served as a trustee of Aspire from 1992 until retiring in December 2022, seeing it grow from one small centre to the current county wide provision. This included a period as Chair. She also served as a secondary school governor from 1979 to 2011.  During that time, she also served as a Justice of the Peace for 25 years until 2012. Liz remains closely involved as a trustee with a charity providing sport and recreation for children and young people.

Geralyn Wilson 

A trustee and board member for Aspire for over 12 years, Geralyn Wilson spent 14 years as Headteacher at Great Marlow School. Her whole career has been dedicated to the education and development of young people, having served as a teacher and senior leader at schools across the Midlands and London. She is a board member and trustee for the ASCL - the professional association for school leaders; is  a course leader on the school improvement team for the Ambition Institute and is the Education Coach on the school improvement team for Teaching Times.

Fiona Bowers

Fiona grew up in Lancashire attending Morecambe High school before moving to Dundee to attend university where she achieved a Masters in Psychology in 1994.  Following this she worked for three years with young offenders before taking time out to travel.  In 1998 she began her career in accountancy and has remained in the profession ever since.  Her background as a partner in a firm means that she has experienced many of the aspects of client service and running a business that enabled her to set up on her own in 2015.  As a business owner she understands the issues that her clients face on a day to day basis and coupled with her accounting and taxation knowledge give her a sound basis to provide excellent service to her clients.  Areas of expertise include company taxation, personal taxation, accounts preparation, payroll services, VAT and business development.