Leadership

Andrew Whitaker
Chief Executive Officer - The White Rose Academies Trust

Andrew Whitaker enjoyed a ten-year career in the University sector, including working as an Associate Senior Lecturer, before moving into the 3-18 education sector as a Senior Leader. As Senior Vice Principal of the UK’s largest all-aged special school based in Barnsley, South Yorkshire, Andrew led all operational areas of the school including Post 16 provision. Throughout a transformative eight years, he project managed a £25m BSF building programme, created a highly successful school improvement consultancy and played a key role in leading...

Senior Leadership Team

Richard Chattoe

Principal

Prior to commencing his role as Principal at Leeds City Academy in March 2019, Richard worked as Vice Principal at Leeds West Academy, with responsibility for the improvement in the quality of Teaching, Learning and Assessment across the school...

Simon Ford
Vice Principal

Simon graduated from Leeds Metropolitan University in 2002 with BA (Hons) in Physical Education. He spent his first six years teaching PE in his hometown of Scunthorpe where he became the Head of PE at the Specialist Sports College...

Vicki Morris
Co-Vice Principal

Vicki graduated from the University of Leeds with a degree in Chemistry in 2011. Whilst studying, she worked as a mentor for Looked After Children and as a relief child support worker and so it seemed like a natural progression when she began working as an unqualified teacher at Royds School in Leeds...

Luke Pollard
Co-Vice Principal

Luke Pollard began his career through Teach First in 2011 as an ICT teacher at Leeds West Academy, becoming the ICT and Business Subject Leader twelve months later. In 2014, he was appointed Lead Practitioner for Computing, leading the Computing departments at Leeds West Academy and Leeds East Academy...

Gemma Edwards

Assistant Principal

Gemma was raised within a military family living in Germany and Cyprus before being educated in Lancashire, England. She gained a BA Honours degree in Human Geography at Nottingham Trent University, before moving to Leeds where she qualified in 2002 as a Geography teacher in secondary education...

	Kelly Allchin Assistant Principal Kelly gained a BSc Honours degree in Psychology and Education Studies at Worcester University before moving to Bristol to complete her PGCE specialising in citizenship education. She began her career working for the local council within the Children Services department with the remit of supporting all primary, secondary and special schools within Telford & Wrekin with their Citizenship & PSHE provision... Read more >>
	Alicia Manners Assistant Principal Alicia has worked in education for over 15 years! She originally was employed by Parklands Girls High School which transitioned to a coeducational school and then evolved into the White Rose Academies Trust... Read more >>
	Marcia Gunson Assistant Principal Marcia left sixth form and went straight into employment, working with unemployed adults delivering employability skills training. Following this, she started volunteering in a youth centre where she developed her passion for working with disadvantaged, young people. She then went onto study... Read more >>
	Liz Armstrong Business and Operations Liz Armstrong has extensive leadership and management experience both in an educational and a commercial setting. Liz worked for a major engineering company for 20 years, latterly as a Project Accountant monitoring and reporting on a £1.6 Billion contract. Liz gained valuable experience in managing... Read more >>