News Blog

TKAT ACE - a champion for every child - provides a dedicated 1:1 tutor for each disadvantaged pupil and their family. This innovative programme has been introduced to every school in the Trust.

The Third Annual TKAT ACE Leads Conference took place last week after a year of rapid expansion of the initiative. The focus this year is on embedding and developing the programme at each school.

Over 60 delegates attended the conference and took part in a range of networking activities designed to strengthen the commitment of the TKAT culture of  “Shared Voice, Shared Belief, Shared Success'

A number of external guest speakers attended the event. Jenny Redford from Children NE gave a challenging presentation on The Unconscious Bias of Poverty.  Beth Willams from ImpactEd led a session on using the ImpactEd platform from evaluation to diagnosis.  Andrew Wright from Action Your Potential gave an impassioned presentation on working with parents in partnership to build #NeuroNinjas. 

Presentations from TKAT speakers included Dr Karen Roberts (CEO) who talked with pride about the past, present and future of TKATACE.  David Linsell (Director for TKAT ACE) gave a summary of the impact of TKAT in 2022-23 and the challenges for 2023-24. Gianni Bianchi (TKAT Director of Inclusion) reinforced the link between The TKAT Attendance Strategy and TKAT ACE.  Sara Walton (Director of SEND and EAL) updated the delegates on the TKATACE/SEND pilot and Bev Iles (Deputy Headteacher / Regional ACE Lead) updated the group on the TKATACE/EYFS pilot.

The conference also welcomed guests from E21C (Education for the 21st Century) Trust which is part of the TKATACE London Partnership. 

Feedback from delegates was very positive:

“Today was fab - it was great challenging stereotypes surrounding poverty - this is something that I think would benefit all staff to hear and identify with”

“The conference was informative and thought-provoking in terms of how I see my practice and how this has impact within the Trust. Combining this with the opportunity to share ideas, problems and solutions with my peers enabled me to walk away with a number of practices I would like to put in place in my setting to improve myself, my ACE team and our students' provision.”

Thank you to all involved in the event.