Dr Tom Ritchie is a Reader and Director of Student Experience in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Warwick, and Academic Lead for AI in Education. A historian by training working within a chemistry department, he brings a cross-disciplinary lens to belonging, student experience, and responsible AI in higher education. He is co-founder of the Centre for Belonging in Education, and hosts the podcast AI Ethics Now. He recently completed a US-UK Fulbright Scholarship at Elon University, North Carolina.
Sam Gardner is a care-experienced speaker, former primary school teacher and creator of Lessons From The Care System™.
Sam spent 20 years in the care system and experienced repeated placement moves, school changes and the lasting impact of never knowing how long anything would last.
Today, they use that lived experience alongside their background in education to help adults better understand what may be happening beneath a child’s behaviour.
Sam's work is about helping professionals see the things children often cannot explain for themselves: fear beneath anger, rejection beneath pushing people away, and the need to feel safe before they can begin to trust.
Through speaking, training and resources, Sam explores behaviour, belonging, placement instability and the small decisions adults make that can follow a child for years.
Sam believe adults have enormous power to either enable or disable a child’s future.
Deirdre is an accredited coach and trainer, and founder of Éistim Consulting. With over 25 years' experience in Higher Education across England and Northern Ireland, she's built a career around a genuine passion for widening participation, with much of her work focused on supporting care-experienced and estranged students.
In 2020, she joined NNECL as one of their Quality Mark Assessors, and has recently taken on the role of Co-Lead.
As Assistant Director for Aimhigher Greater Merseyside, Deirdre set up the Care Leavers into HE Network, helping partner institutions achieve the Buttle UK Quality Mark. She was also a member of the National Advisory Group, leading the Quality Mark pilot for Further Education Colleges.
Deirdre has substantial experience leading and managing teams within widening participation and careers, and she brings this experience directly into her coaching, working with managers and practitioners who want that same depth of understanding from their coach.
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Nicola is a Adviser Engagement Partner at UCAS, where she works to support the supporters of under-represented students, including care-experienced and estranged students. She has worked in widening access and participation since joining UCAS in 2016. She co-authored the 2022 Next Steps report on the experience of students from a care background. A former teacher, Nicola is strong believer in the transformative potential of education, and the importance of collaborative working to drive improvements for all learners – whatever their background, and is now on the journey to becoming an Independent Visitor for a child in care.
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Sandhya is a results driven and analytical director with substantial experience in social impact, ESG, EDI, commercial business development and team leadership across multiple Fortune 500 companies in over 15 markets. She now leads the skills, regeneration and employment portfolio at Thames Freeport. Her portfolio drives the creation of 22,000 jobs and improving the educational attainment across all skill levels across the freeport area.
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Access, Student Success and Development Officer at the University of Manchester.
Abbie has worked in the HE sector for 9 years, recently moving from an Access role to a Success role, where she manages a range of bursary and scholarship programmes for students from underrepresented backgrounds. Her work focuses on improving student experience, belonging, and success through financial support, targeted interventions, and community-building initiatives. In 2025, she co-created the Made For It programme, a bespoke support offer for scholarship and bursary recipients designed to strengthen students' sense of belonging and connection to the University. Within her work, Abbie wants to build the sense that students matter to us as a University, showing this through targeted transitional activity, additional wellbeing support, and where required, being the link between our students and other key services at the University, to ensure all our students thrive on their university journey.
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Access, Student Success and Development Officer at the University of Manchester.
Emma has over 15 years of experience supporting students to access, participate in and succeed within higher education. Her work focuses on improving belonging, wellbeing and outcomes for underrepresented groups, particularly care experienced, estranged and sanctuary-seeking students, as well as those facing complex barriers to success.
Throughout her career, Emma has worked collaboratively across institutions and the wider sector to develop more inclusive and supportive student experiences. Emma is passionate about equity, social mobility and student success, and believes that every student should feel valued and able to thrive during their time at university.
Known for her compassionate and collaborative approach, Emma enjoys bringing people together to share expertise, develop practical solutions and drive positive change. She is committed to helping students fulfil their potential and feel a genuine sense of belonging in higher education.
CEO of Bee N Spired CIC
Rees Davis-Campbell is the Founder and CEO of Bee N Spired CIC, a social enterprise co-designed with 54 care-experienced young people over two years before launching in January 2025. Rees was born into foster care and spent two years in Kenya with a family he did not know when left on a "family holiday", an experience that became the foundation for Bee N Spired's model and his personal brand, Rees Rises. Under his leadership, Bee N Spired has achieved City and Guilds and ILM Approved Centre status and expanded into 4 locations: London, Norfolk, West Berkshire and Oxfordshire. Rees was named Institute of Directors Aspiring Director of the Year 2025 and has completed the IoD Certificate in Company Direction as a scholar of the Stephen Lawrence Day Foundation. He is an active speaker on lived experience, leadership, and human systems change, through his "Power of One" framework.
Director of Young People & Wellbeing- Bee N Spired
Abby Lomas is the Director of Young People & Wellbeing at Bee N Spired, joining the organisation in March 2026 to lead its national wellbeing strategy across London, Norfolk, West Berkshire and Oxfordshire. Abby is a student mental health nurse, currently undertaking her MNurs training at the University of Birmingham. She brings developing clinical knowledge alongside lived experience and multi‑agency practice across health, social care and education.
Abby’s work centres trauma‑informed, relational and human‑centred approaches, shaping programmes that prioritise psychological safety, empowerment and authentic youth voice. Her leadership focuses on human systems change and creating environments where young people thrive.
Safeguarding and Student Welfare practitioner and doctoral researcher at the University of Wolverhampton.
Melanie's work focuses on belonging, student support, inclusive practice and the conditions that enable students to feel recognised and valued in higher education. Her doctoral research explores belonging, self-definition and creative methodologies, including found poetic inquiry, with a focus on how students represent and negotiate belonging within institutional spaces.
Student Life & Wellbeing Manager, ICMP
Demi Demetriades has worked in HE for 35 years, supporting students through roles in finance, accommodation and wellbeing. In her current role as Student Life and Wellbeing Manager at ICMP she is the designated contact for care experienced students guiding them from entry to graduation. She is committed to creating a supportive, inclusive and engaging university experience where our care experienced students can thrive both personally and academically.
Head of Access & Participation, ICMP
Hannah Trott has worked in access and participation roles for 12 years working with pre-16 students from underrepresented groups and now also with current students in her role as Head of Access and Participation. She oversees the support provided to care experienced students and wants to ensure the institution offers appropriate support that allows them to get the most from their experience. Her role has grown her interest in developing approaches to raise knowledge and awareness of staff about care experience.
Amy Gower; Access Projects Officer, Oxford Brooks University
Jo Duckett; Access a& Outreach Officer, Study Higher
Amy and Jo collaboratively run Future Pathways, a project which supports care-experienced learners in Years 9-13, as part of the UniConnect programme. Their work with care-experienced young people has spanned three and five years respectively, working with dozens of care-experienced young people throughout that time, as well as organising and maintaining relationships with multiple virtual schools, carers, teachers, and other key stakeholders.
Amy and Jo have worked in education for over 35 years between them, and have presented at multiple Virtual School events and conferences. Amy’s background is in academic research before joining the widening participation world in 2023, and her PhD (awarded 2022) examined gender equality in state secondary schools from 1970-2000. Jo has over 25 years’ experience in education and runs other outreach programmes including Brookes & Beyond, a similar project based at Oxford Brookes University, and a project for mature learners.
Student Experienceince, Diversity and Inclusion Manager
Paul has worked with care experienced students for over 10 years at The University of Sheffield. As well as managing a student facing team, Student Experience Diversity and Inclusion, he contributes to policy and guidance for The University of Sheffield relating to care experienced students. Paul’s initial work establishing a student lifecycle approach for care experienced students was captured in Enhancing Student Learning and Development In Cross-Border Higher Education, Roberts, Komives (Eds), 2016. Since then he has helped ensure The University of Sheffield maintains and enhances its offer to care experienced students through an ever changing HE environment.
Jasmine has worked as the student point of contact for 4 years, contributing to the development of the model of engagement with care experienced and estranged students at the University of Sheffield. Previously, Jasmine worked within Sheffield Hallam Students’ Union primarily on the BAME Ambassador Scheme, Co-ordinating Peer Support projects and student wellbeing.
