Governance and Documentation

Belinda Logan is Director of Education and Co-Founder of ReconnectEd Community Interest Company (The Reconnect Education Project). Belinda also combines this work with her Education Consultancy.

Belinda has successfully led Special Schools and Alternative Provision Schools and has valuable experience as an OFSTED inspector and  School Governor.

Belinda has also trained as a Coach through the University of Manchester and taught on the NPQML programme and has worked as an Achievement Coach for the charity Achievement for All. More recently she has worked as a Programme Director for a reducing exclusions project with Right to Succeed.  

Rob lives in Middlewich, Cheshire, with his partner Kathryn and daughter Sophie.  Rob has worked in food retailing for 32 years, many of these have been spent being a Store Manager for Tesco Stores Limited.  During his 15-year career, Rob had the opportunity of working in many areas of Britain and was based at the Macclesfield branch for over three years.  Robs main responsibilities were to try and keep customers and colleagues as happy as possible whilst managing the bottom line profit.

Rob’s spare time is mainly spent tinkering with his classic car and motorcycle collection as well as watching motor-sport. Having been a YES Trust trustee and governor of The Fermain Academy since 2019, Rob has recently taken on the role as Chair of the YES Trust and looks forward to using his skills and experience to help in adding value that will benefit the school and its pupils.

Tim Haselwood is a Chartered Accountant who spent most of his professional career with Deloitte LLP specialising in external and internal audit, IT consultancy, Management Accounting and Financial controls. He then spent two years as Business Manager of Hollinhey Primary School in Sutton near Macclesfield and from September 2015 until April 2022 he was the Business Director of Tytherington School in Macclesfield, where he was responsible for all the business aspects of the school. Tim is also a Chair of Governors at Hurdsfield Primary School in Macclesfield.

In addition to being a Trustee of the YES Trust, Tim also chairs the Finance, HR and Premises Committee. Tim is married to Jan and they have two grown-up daughters, one of which is teaching English in China. Living in Wincle near Macclesfield, Tim and Jan have two grandchildren as well as a lazy golden retriever, a very noisy Shichonpoo, some alpacas who cut the grass and a wind turbine.

Lisa, is a dedicated mindfulness practitioner with over 15 years’ experience working with children and young people and education professionals. She has spent over 10 years working in the education sector and the last 5 years helping teachers and school leaders to improve their whole school approach to mental health and wellbeing. Her experience of how barriers to learning impact the ‘whole child’ fuels her passion and determination to promote and enable environments where learning, wellbeing and relationships are accessible to all.

During Lisa’s time working with Visyon (a Children and Young Persons Mental Health Charity), she developed and delivered a range of wellbeing programmes, combining theory into evidence-based practice. Lisa is also trained to teach education staff to implement wellbeing programmes such as Friends Resilience, Incredible Years Classroom Management, Emotion Coaching U.K. and to deliver Paws.b (a leading mindfulness curriculum).

At present Lisa is coordinating the Wellbeing for Education Recovery Initiative across Cheshire East, working to a greater depth with individual settings to support them in embedding trauma recovery principles into their whole school approach.

Chris has worked in the technology sector for over 50 years. He started his own software company in the 70’s, selling it in the early 90’s, and started a new career in the global IT company, ICL.

Chris established a new business in 1999, working with organisations that wanted to win major bids, and in 2008 this morphed into Get to Great, his current business. He has a deep understanding of change, and of running a business and all that that entails.

Chris is still actively working but has created time over the last 10 years to undertake workshops with 6th Form Colleges, focusing on life skills. Since moving back to Cheshire two years ago, Chris has become involved with The Warrington & Cheshire Pledge, working with them as part of the government’s NCS scheme this summer

Chris is passionate about education and helping young people realise their true potential.

In 2022, Chris created an initiative targeted at Inspiring & Engaging Future Sales Talent in secondary schools across the UK.

Wendy Bower-Choyce is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Personnel & Development who has spent much of her career supporting businesses with their people management and development challenges across a wide range of sectors.

She is a commercially focused business consultant with over 35 years of Human Resource Management, Training & Development experience with key areas of focus including Business Strategy & Growth, New Start-up businesses and Organisational Change.

Wendy spent her early career in Further Education at South Cheshire College during which time her roles included both “front line” (lecturer) as well as “people / pupil management roles.

More latterly she has set up and run a HR Consultancy Business (Choyce People) from offices based in Holmes Chapel until selling it to one of her clients in 2015.

Since then Wendy has continued to provide consultancy support to a number of businesses’  as well as most recently she has found time to become a Trustee for The Yes Trust and hopes to be able to provide support to both the existing and new schools within the Trust.

Nic was the founding Principal of The Fermain Academy, from design, to oversubscribed provision every year since opening, to ‘universal’ grade for the provision from the Local Authority, and culminating with an Outstanding Ofsted in 2018. Nic is now continuing to work closely with the DFE and EFSA as he embarks on a similar journey as the CEO of the YES Trust, opening The Axis Academy in September 2020 – a brand new SEN provision in Crewe for young people with a diagnosis for Social, Emotional and Mental Health needs.

Nic has a background of working with SEN and vulnerable students throughout his career overseeing many different aspects of the schools such as; covering the school development plan, SEF, curriculum, Behaviour & Welfare, Attainment planning, whole school data and completing the paperwork to expand to a MAT. Nic also wrote the application and bid that won one of his schools the SEN school of the year 2013/14, and more recently, The Fermain Academy’s shortlisting for Alternative Provision School of the Year.

Nic has a passion for developing all, continuing to lecture at three universities and multiple teaching school alliances to deliver CPD on Leadership at Senior and Middle levels, SEN in the classroom and early intervention and multiple elements on managing behaviour. Currently Nic has recently completed his National Professional Qualification for Executive Leadership (NPQEL) and is currently embarking on a Doctorate of Education (EdD) in Strategic Leadership for Education settings.

Chris was appointed as Business Manager of The Fermain Academy in 2015, the founding Academy of the YES Trust, and played a lead role in establishing the systems and processes which underpin the great work the Trust does today. Chris is now the Trust’s Director of Business, and has overseen the opening of two new Free Schools, and a small Independent School in that time, with a 3^rd new Free School also in the pre-opening phase.

Chris has a background working for the Local Authority within the Business Support and Schools Capital Strategy teams, and as a Business Manager / CFO in three Special and AP Trusts. He has experience in leading the conversion to Multi Academy Trust from maintained school at a previous Trust, as well as setting up the Fermain Academy from scratch and bringing new Academies in to an existing MAT set up.

Committed to ensuring that the Trust’s Academies have the best possible staffing, resources and environment in which to inspire our learners, Chris oversees finance, H&S, HR/recruitment and operational leadership across the Trust, and works closely with Senior Leaders, Office Managers and Site Managers to help drive standards in our schools.

Chris completed the CIPFA Level 7 Certificate in School Financial and Operational Leadership in 2020, and carries out the role of Chief Finance Officer for the Trust

In post since September 2020 Helen is working as part of the Executive Leadership Team to ensure that the quality of curriculum and education across the Trust is maintained to an outstanding level and one which prepares young people to become fully functioning members of a global society.  Helen brings to the post a wealth of experience through coaching leaders, training teachers and promoting outstanding teaching and learning across Primary and Secondary settings, having led in both mainstream and alternative provision.  

Helen designed and delivered an innovative Home Office funded project, aimed at re-engaging and improving the life chances of some of our most vulnerable pupils, which was praised as being the only one nationally to achieve its aims. She has taken on failing schools which have then been judged to be Good by Ofsted. 

Helen puts pupils at the heart of all she does and brings not only enthusiasm and passion to everything she does, but an intelligence and depth of understanding of pedagogy which informs her training of teachers and leaders; she is herself an outstanding practitioner and uses her degree in French and Russian Studies to continue to inspire and motivate language learning and literacy in children and adults alike. Her passion for language teaching and literacy has led her to write and develop an exciting inter-generational language scheme which is now in the implementation stage; she hopes to map the impact of this as part of her EdD studies.