The team is made up of five former teachers (Elaine Crotty, Elaine and John Wyllie, Sheila Loughlin and Brian Padgett) with extensive school experience at all leadership levels, school inspection, and deprivation intervention. This team works in partnership with the network of Forgotten 40 headteachers and regularly reports to INEOS regarding the progress of the project and impact of the funding.
John Wyllie
John spent 32 years working in Scottish secondary schools- first as Head of English, then Head of Guidance, and for the last 20 years as Deputy Head. He has for the past 6 years been working with Elaine as a Trustee of The Daily Mile to promote it globally.
Sheila Loughlin
Sheila began teaching in the mid-1970s. She was a headteacher in Macclesfield and Stockport. She was involved in setting up the British School in Tokyo, was a local authority advisor for Cheshire, and worked as school consultant for Chester Diocese. She also spent 10 years working as a school inspector with Ofsted. She has chaired and sat on IEBs and currently serves as Achievement Director of the Rural Church Schools Academy Trust (RCSAT).
Elaine Crotty
Elaine has 27 years teaching experience, originally in key stage 2 before specialising in early years education. Elaine was instrumental in getting the Forgotten 40 team together.
Elaine Wyllie
Elaine taught in Scottish primaries for 35 years, as Teacher, Principal Teacher, DHT and latterly as Headteacher. She worked in curriculum development and was a CPD provider with Scholastic, Learning Unlimited, Pearson and Stirling Council. She was Becta ICT Primary Teacher of the Year 2004, and Pride of Britain Teacher of the Year 2016. She founded The Daily Mile in 2012, which she works continuously to promote.
Brian Padgett
Brian began teaching in inner-city Salford in the 1970s. He spent 14 years as a headteacher of two schools, in Salford and Whitehaven in Cumbria. He became a school inspector with Ofsted in 1995 and one of Her Majesty’s Inspectors for Schools (HMI) in 1999, serving for 15 years. Brian has been active in research into educational disadvantage since 1985 and currently works with Manchester University’s Institute of Education and Chester Diocese as a consultant.
Ursula Heath
Ursula has worked in the INEOS Communications team since 2014, with a specific focus on charitable giving. She has helped to develop and scale up The Daily Mile since 2016 and is passionate about helping children from all backgrounds access opportunities to enrich their learning and their lives.
Four headteachers from the pilot schools have been engaged in developing the evaluation aspects of the project, advising and helping us to establish best practice.
Vanessa Thomson- Oakwood Primary School, Glasgow
David Akers- Ward Jackson Church of England Primary School, Hartlepool
Anne Clinton- St Edmund’s & St Patrick’s Primary Schools, Manchester
Greg Edwards- The Priory Parish Primary School, Birkenhead
Following the success of this model, we would like to encourage other Headteachers to be involved in different aspects of the project.
Core Principles
The Forgotten 40 project aims to empower the headteachers of 100 primary schools serving some of the UK’s most deprived communities, giving them additional and flexible funding to meet the wellbeing and learning needs of children growing up in particularly challenging circumstances. The aim of the project is to improve the experience of childhood and remove barriers to learning, rather than directly targeting academic attainment.