Offender Related Services Forum SIG | Wednesday, 10 September 2014
 
Speakers

Maria Thomas (Chair)
Head of Partnership Management
Shaw Trust

Maria has 15 years experience in Welfare to Work and Social Justice and her remit has always been to respond to emerging policy and strategies of Welsh Assembly Government and the UK Government by leading and shaping delivery models that meet the needs and is fit for purpose for some of the most vulnerable in our society.



Amber Shotton (Co-Chair)
Regional Development Manager
A4e

Amber is the Regional Development Manager for A4e supporting both operational delivery and business development across London, South-east and the East of England. Previously, she worked within a British multinational facilities management and construction services PLC. Her work experience encompasses building strong local partnerships & strategic relationships to secure complementary support and funding, working with local and regional funding bodies (e.g. SFA, MoJ, Local Authorities, LEP’s, Health Groups) to design and develop appropriate customer journeys for varied barriers including ex-offenders, Substance Misuse, Homelessness, etc. and successfully developing and implementing partnership solutions including negotiating commercial agreements. In addition, Amber is the Co-Chair of the AELP/ERSA Offender Forum.



Baillie Aaron
Executive Director
Spark Inside

Baillie Aaron is the founder and Executive Director of Spark Inside, a UK charity supporting high-risk young people in the criminal justice system, through professional life coaching. She is also the founder of Venturing Out, a US charity teaching entrepreneurship to men and women in prison. Both ventures seek to expose latent human potential, and adopt strength-based approaches toward empowering people in prison to achieve legitimate self-sufficiency on release. Baillie is a graduate of Harvard and Cambridge universities, has spoken at TEDx and on the BBC, and is a qualified co-active life coach. She was honoured to be inducted into the Junior Achievement Boston Business Hall of Fame in 2010. She currently resides in London. For more information, please visit www.sparkinside.org or www.baillieaaron.com.




Kirsty Scholefield
DWP

More details to follow shortly.




Donia Slyzuk
Service Design and Bidding Manager
Nacro

Donia joined Nacro for the second time in February 2012 and is currently Area Manager for Housing in Essex responsible for the overall operational management of the business area. 

Donia has recently concluded an eight month secondment working as Service Design and Bidding Manager. Donia has nearly 20 years experience of working with vulnerable clients including offenders as a commissioner and deliverer of services.




Alice Ashworth
Crisis

More details to follow shortly.



Andy Winter
Chief Executive
BHT (Brighton Housing Trust)

Andy Winter has worked for BHT since 1985 and has been Chief Executive since 2003.

For many years he had overall responsibility for BHT’s alcohol, drug and mental health work, and published research into suicide and drug related deaths.

Andy has a passion for continuous improvement in services, and has enthusiastically embraced social media as a means for exploring ideas, receiving feedback, and for engaging with new people.

He has a Post Graduate Diploma in Management Development, is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, and is a member of Sussex County Cricket Club. South African by birth, he was a conscientious objector, moving to England in 1979 to avoid conscription into the apartheid army.




Wendy Taylor
Executive Director
BHT (Brighton Housing Trust)

Wendy is the second of BHT’s two Executive Directors with responsibility for client services.

Her portfolio includes housing and support services (such as mental health, homeless young people (Hastings) and floating support).  Wendy also leads on service quality and continuous improvement.

She has worked in the social care sector since 1988, initially in local authority residential care and since 1992 in the homelessness and housing field in London and Brighton.

Her experience covers homeless day services and street outreach work as well as supported housing and mental health. She managed a street outreach team in London prior to joining BHT in 2003. Within BHT Wendy initially managed First Base Day Centre and developed Dine! our catering social enterprise. 

Wendy’s many years of front line experience ensures the client experience is at the centre of service delivery.




Maeve McGoldrick
Policy and Communications Director
ERSA

Maeve Joined ERSA as the Policy and Communications Director in January 2014. Previously she spent almost 6 years at an east London charity, Community Links, where she was responsible for the policy, public affairs and campaigns activity which centred around work, welfare and poverty. Before that Maeve worked for an international anti-poverty organisation, ATD Fourth World. Starting as a family support worker she went on to lead the Working Neighbourhoods Team project and the Government Relations programme for the UK and Europe. Maeve has held other campaign and communication roles with the British Youth Council and Rethink, the mental health charity. In 2010 she was the UK ambassador for the EU year against poverty and currently sits on a number of influential committees and advisory groups related to welfare and unemployment.




Tim Chewter
Research and Project Manager
AELP

Tim joined AELP full time in 2010 as a Researcher, providing both an internal and external research function for AELP. As well as undertaking research into the demographics and representation of its membership, Tim also undertook a number of research studies focusing on skills funding, qualifications, teaching, learning & assessment, supply chain practises, Ofsted grading, Apprenticeship reforms and workforce data. This research has been used among government agencies to influence and inform key policy decisions as well as highlighting the support needs of the sector. A further two recent studies were conducted looking at the support needs of staff involved in Traineeship and Apprenticeship delivery.

Tim’s current role as Research & Project Manager led him to manage the £700k Apprenticeship Application Support Fund in 2013, enabling providers to engage and support young people who had previously been unsuccessful in applying for an Apprenticeship.  In recent months, Tim has been heavily involved in the management and coordination of the £2.5m Traineeship and Apprenticeship Staff Support Programmes, commissioned by The Education and Training Foundation.

Tim is part of the delivery team at AELP and is the policy lead for Offender Learning.