27: Katharine Birbalsingh On UK Education Reform, Career Controversy And Educating Children During A Pandemic

In this episode, Jane talks to Katharine Birbalsingh, British education reformer and headmistress of the Michaela Community; a state school in North London where GCSE results are among the best in the country. But Katharine is a rarely out of the media, and not always in glowing reports of her school. Since her blog caught the attention of senior ministers and she was invited to speak at the Conservative Party Conference on educational reform, Katharine is often seen as a highly controversial figure – she talks here about her belief in discipline, having received death threats for her views, and why she fights so hard for what she does.

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Why do so many of us go careering into motherhood, unaware of just how hard it is to have a meaningful career as well as family commitments? And why don’t men struggle with their careers in the same way? We talk about the rise of flexible jobs and work anywhere policies, executive burnout and the pressure to be “always on,” Government claims that 75% of mothers are in work, and yet there's being in work and there's having a career. If you’ve had a career break, been on maternity leave, want a career change, want to relaunch yourself back into work or just want a happier balance between work and everything else, Careering Into Motherhood is here with practical advice, insightful interviews and real human stories. Jane Johnson helps empower women and negotiate with employers to offer flexible working so they can stay in their careers. She negotiated her own senior role as a job-share, and in 2019 she set up the Careering Into Motherhood Facebook Group to promote discussion around flexible working, the group now has more than 8,000 members and a successful women’s mentoring programme.