Governance
King Solomon Academy Governance
Academies are schools funded by the government with the freedom to govern independently – but all are accountable to the Secretary of State for Education. To share resources and best practice, many are part of multi-academy trusts – a network of schools under one legal body.
King Solomon Academy is part of Ark Schools - a leading education charity and one of the country’s top-performing academy operators. Ark is non-denominational and does not make any profit from running its schools.
Ark’s relationship with the Secretary of State is set out in the master funding agreement. There are also supplemental funding agreements for each individual school in the network, including King Solomon Academy.
Ark Schools Master Funding Agreement
King Solomon Academy Supplemental Funding Agreement
Every school in the Ark network is the legal responsibility of the Ark Schools Board. This board focuses on statutory duties and delegates most day-to-day responsibilities to each school’s individual Local Governing Body (LGB). This means that Ark Academy's governors are able to concentrate on the things that really matter – educational strategy, school outcomes and aspiration.
The Ark Schools Articles of Association and Decision Making Framework scheme of delegation can be found on the Ark Schools website.
Our local governing body
King Solomon Academy’s LGB is made up as follows:
- Six to 10 members appointed by Ark, to include the Chair - usually people with a local connection or interest who are committed to supporting educational opportunity in the area.
- The Principal
- Two parent governors
- Two staff governors
- One local local authority representative
Ark aims to create a balanced group that will have the right skills, connections and dynamic for the LGB to work well and support the school in achieving exceptional performance:
- Good insight into the specific challenges at the school and the general challenges of operating top-quality schools
- Excellent community links
- Specific skills as needed by/relevant to the school
- A link to the senior executive team of Ark
The LGB meets four times a year.
Contacting the governors
The Clerk to the Governors is Sakina Marzban (sakina.marzban@arkonline.org). Governors can be contacted through the Clerk.
If you are interested in becoming a governor, please visit the Ark Schools website. If you have any governance-related queries, please contact the Clerk.
Current governors
Katie Oliver (Ark Appointed Governor) (Chair)
Katie Oliver is Projects Director for Ark, responsible for all aspects of the pre-opening process for schools joining the Ark network. She joined Ark in 2006 and has worked closely with all 35 schools in the network.
Nafsika Butler-Thalassis (Local Authority Governor)
Nafsika Butler-Thalassis is the Cabinet member for Adult Social Care, Public Health and the Voluntary Sector in Westminster Council. Additionally, she works for the BME Health Forum, a local charity that specialises in reducing health inequalities for Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic communities. She has two children, one of whom attends King Solomon Academy.
Paul Dunning (Ark Appointed Governor)
Anton Gjoka (Parent Governor)
With one child at King Solomon Academy, secondary school maths teacher Anton is delighted to support the school as a parent governor.
Trevor McCrisken (Ark Appointed Governor)
Dr Trevor McCrisken is an Associate Professor in Politics and International Studies at the University of Warwick. His main teaching and research is on US foreign policy, particularly the role of national identity, the use of force, and portrayals of foreign policy in popular culture. He is also Chair of BASIC, a London-based non-governmental organisation promoting dialogue on nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament. As a Widening Participation and Outreach academic leader at Warwick, he has worked extensively with a number of schools and colleges nationally to encourage students from diverse backgrounds to apply to university. For the last four years has collaborated particularly with the students and teachers at King Solomon Academy. Trevor has been hugely impressed with the dedication and aptitude of the KSA students and the ethos of the school. He feels privileged to be able to work with KSA and now to serve as a school governor.
Fatma Nasr (Parent Governor)
As a parent and language teacher, Fatma is always concerned about the quality of teaching and learning in schools.Fatma strongly believes that we must tackle the inequality in education, and is very willing to collaborate to achieve this. Fatma is also aware of the challenges that educators may face in schools nowadays, and wants to contribute to improving the lives of all the children and teachers by collaborating with the leaders of schools to be more cost effective.
Sinem Oyzoyn (Ark Appointed Governor)
Sinem is an Ark Appointed Governor on the LGB.
Kristen Shannon (Safeguarding Link Governor) (Ark Appointed Governor)
Kristen joined ARK Schools in 2010 after working in human resources and recruitment for Uncommon Schools in the United States. Kristen worked as the Head of Recruitment for ARK Schools, leading the recruitment team to support the schools in the network to find the highest quality staff for their leadership, teaching and support staff vacancies. She is currently the Head of Programme for ARK Teacher Training and looks after all the operational components of the training of new teacher in the network. Kristen has a degree in educational policy and history from Northwestern University. As governor she brings her expertise in the fields of inter faith dialogue and pastoral ministry.
Julian Simmonds (Finance Link Governor)
Julian Simmonds spent his entire career at Citigroup and retired as an Executive Vice President in 2001. He has now other business interests in the property sector and is an independent non-executive director of VTB Capital PLC, a major Russian bank. He has 2 children and 1 grandson. After retiring from Citigroup, Julian spent 8 years as chair of governors at Notting Hill & Ealing High School overseeing a complete rebuild of the heart of the school. Since moving to Chelsea, he has become a governor and chairs the Finance Committee at the Chelsea Academy. Julian also sits on the advisory council of the London Philharmonic Orchestra. He enjoys strenuous work-outs in the gym. Julian hopes that his various experiences will help him make a positive difference to the Academy.
Roger Vinter (SEND Link Governor)
Roger's motivation for being a governor is that he feels passionate about every child no matter what their background being given an equal chance to succeed academically and improve their future life opportunities. As a governor Roger brings his general experience and educational knowledge to bear in discussion with school leaders and not only support but can suggest improvements in educational standards and student welfare.
Max Haimendorf (Executive Principal)
Max Haimendorf graduated from Oxford and joined the first cohort of the Teach First programme, teaching Science in West London. Following work at Teach First central office he joined the consultants Oliver Wyman where he worked in finance strategy. Whilst there he wrote about the importance of small schools. In 2008 he was appointed as Secondary Headteacher of King Solomon Academy, starting the Secondary part of the school in September 2009. He has now led KSA through two outstanding Ofsted inspections and to achieve the highest GCSE results in the country for a non-selective school in 2015. He became all-through Principal of KSA and Executive Principal of Ark Paddington Green Primary Academy in September 2016.
All appointments are made by the Director of Governance for Ark. The term of a governor is three years, except for the Principal, who remains a governor for the duration of his time in post.
The register of interests and attendance information for governors can be found here:
King Solomon Academy - Governor Register of Interests 2023-24.pdf
Ark King Solomon Academy LGB Attendance Log 2022-23.pdf
