Governing Board and School Commitee
As part of the Seckford Foundation, the overall responsibility for Woodbridge School, the Abbey and Queen’s House lies with the Foundation’s Board of Governors, whose biographies are set out below;
The Board meets formally four times a year for the purpose of supervising the running of the Foundation and providing it with strategic direction. To assist in achieving the aims and objectives of the Charity the Governors have formed three principal committees - Care and Grants; School; and Finance and Audit – each of which has the power, subject to Board approval, to add three co-opted members with particular expertise relevant to the business of that committee. In addition, an Investment sub-committee exists to monitor the performance of the Foundation’s external investment fund manager; a Nominations committee reviews the skillset of the board and identifies and recommends the appointment of new Governors; and the Compliance and Quality Assurance committee ensures that the discrete parts of the Foundation have in place appropriate systems and processes to monitor compliance and procure quality improvement.
The Foundation’s Free Schools are the responsibility of the Seckford Foundation Free School Trust, a separate charity which reports to the Governors.
The School Committee comprises Governors Jonathan Ripman (Chairman), Roger Finbow (Chairman of the Foundation), Professor Jane Wright and Martina King; two co-opted members, Clare Newton and Mike Carter, details of whom are set out below, and Officers and Senior staff comprising the Headmaster, the Master of the Abbey, the Head of Queen’s House, the Bursar/Director, the Second Master and the Foundation’s Head of Finance.
Clare
Newton was the editor of Longman Group’s
schools publishing division having graduated from Bristol University. Having
brought up four children and supported her husband, a circuit judge, she now
runs a traditional breeds farm. She is a church warden at Cotton
Church.
Mike
Carter joined Lloyds Bank after leaving Norwich School in 1983
and prior to leaving the Bank in 2009 to pursue a portfolio and consultancy
career was responsible for developing and building relationships with hundreds
of commercial clients in the Suffolk and North Essex region. He is a
non-executive director of DanceEast.
 |
John Carrington
Chairman of Compliance & Quality Assurance and Finance & Audit Committees
John was educated at East Ham Grammar School, the London School of Economics, Edinburgh University and London Business School.
John’s career has been spent mainly in the telecommunications industry, initially with BT whom he joined in 1967, and in Cable & Wireless plc. He was the founding CEO of Cellnet (now O2) in 1983 and of Mercury One-to-one (now T Mobile) in 1989. Between 1993 and 1995 he was responsible within C&W for its businesses in the Caribbean, South America, Africa and South East Asia and was Group Managing Director of Mobile Systems International plc from 1995-1997. Since 1997 he has held a number of non-executive chairmanships and directorships in the telecommunications and IT sectors.
John is a Past Master of the Worshipful Company of Information Technologists, a Liveryman of the Clockmakers Company and a Fellow of the Royal Computer Society. He is also a Council member and Chairman of the Finance Committee of Gresham College, the charity founded in 1597 by Sir Thomas Gresham and supported by the Mercers’ Company and the Corporation of London to provide free public lectures in the City and now, via the internet, throughout the world.
|
 |
Wendy Evans-Hendrick
Member of Care & Grants Committee
Wendy holds a BA (Hons) degree from London University in Town Planning. After spending a short period of time as a Town Planner, she moved into the field of Housing Association Development firstly in Norfolk and then in Suffolk.
She has been Director of Development & Property Services for Orwell Housing Association for the past 14 years and also acts as the Director of Development for the e² development consortium working on behalf of 3 other Associations operating across East Anglia.
She is a Trustee of a homeless charity St Johns Housing Trust.
|
 |
Roger Finbow
Chairman
of the Foundation and member of all committees
Roger
was educated at Woodbridge School, Mansfield College Oxford (MA Law) and the
College of Law.
He
joined Ashurst Morris Crisp (now Ashurst LLP) as a trainee in 1975 and became a
partner in 1985, specialising in Corporate and Competition Law. He retired from
the partnership in 2009 but remains a consultant. Between 1989 and 2004 he was
responsible for the recruitment into the firm of trainee solicitors. He is the
author of UK Merger Control: Law and Practice.
He
is currently a member of the Competition Commission, a Governor of the College
of Law, Chairman of the City Solicitors Educational Trust, Chairman of Ipswich
Town plc and a vice president of Ipswich Town Football Club, a director of
British Universities and Colleges Sport, a member of the Mansfield College
Development Board and chair of its Remuneration Committee and he has a number
of other non executive roles.
|
 |
Bill Mayne
Vice Chairman of the Foundation and Chairman of Beccles Free School
Bill was educated at Merchant Taylors School and Wye College London University (BSc
Hons in Agriculture).
After
graduating he joined Pauls plc, being engaged variously in malting, pet food
manufacture and agriculture. He subsequently led the management buy out of BOCM
Pauls, the UK’s leading animal feeds business, from which he retired
as chief executive in 2012.
|
 |
Reverend Canon Kevan McCormack
Member
of Care & Grants Committee
Kevan
was educated at Southampton University where he gained a Certificate in
Theology.
He
was ordained in 1980. After a number of roles as a curate and parish priest in
Ross on Wye and Leominster he became the chaplain of Royal Hospital School
Holbrook in 1987 before being appointed rector of St Mary’s Parish
Church Woodbridge in 2001. He is also honorary chaplain to Ipswich Town
Football Club, Suffolk Coastal District Council, Woodbridge Royal British
Legion and Rock Barracks. He became a Canon in 2009.
He
is Vice-Chairman of St Mary’s Primary School, Woodbridge.
|
 |
Inga Grimsey
Member of Finance & Audit Committee and Chairman of
Saxmundham Free School
Inga
was educated at Gravesend Grammar School and Regent Street Polytechnic (BA Hons
Business Studies).
Inga
spent fifteen years in commerce with Levi Strauss, Sainsbury and Storehouse,
undertaking roles in marketing, brand management and general management. She
then moved to the not for profit sector where she ran Ski Club of Great Britain
before joining the National Trust, first being responsible for the
Trust’s commercial operations and later for the management of one
third of the Trust’s properties including those in the East of
England. Most recently, until her retirement in 2010, she was Director General
of the Royal Horticultural Society.
She
is currently Chair of the Heritage Lottery Fund in the East of England.
|
 |
Jonathan Ripman
Chairman of School Committee and member of Finance and Audit
Committee
Jonathan
was educated at Rugby School, St Catharine’s College Cambridge (MA
Law) and The College of Law, Lancaster Gate.
He
joined Gotelee & Goldsmith (now Gotelee) as a trainee in 1979 and
became a partner in 1983. He specialises in Commercial Litigation and has a
niche practice in Road Transport Law.
Jonathan
is President of Suffolk and North Essex Law Society and Chair of Trustees of
Cancer Campaign Suffolk and of PACT (Parents Conciliation Trust).
|
 |
Dr Nicola Trepte
Member of Care & Grants Committee
Nicola
was brought up overseas but educated in Eastbourne and Brighton and at St
Thomas’ Hospital London, where she qualified as a doctor in
1988.
She
then trained as a General Practitioner but subsequently retrained in hospital
medicine and became a Consultant in 2000.In 2004 she established a new Medical
Assessment Unit at Ipswich hospital, a unit nationally recognised for its
performance and innovation and for which she is now lead.
Nicola
is a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians.
|
 |
James Wellesley Wesley
Chairman of Seckford Foundation Free Schools Trust
James
graduated from Cambridge University (MA Economics).
Following
graduation he joined J.P. Morgan as a commercial banker and then moved to
Granville, a private UK investment bank, where he specialised in corporate
finance. He became a Managing Director in 1996. Granville was taken over by
Robert W Baird, a private US investment bank, in 1999, and James was appointed
head of Baird’s UK equities and investment banking operations in
2003. He is now a partner in Wyvern, a private investment banking
firm.
James
is founder and non executive Chairman of Harris Hill, a recruitment consultancy
specialising in the charity and not for profit sector, and a founder and non
executive director of Edenhouse ERP Holdings, an SAP consultancy.
|
 |
John White
Member of Care and Grants Committee.
Education: Reading School and Leeds University.
After a brief initial career in local government finance, during which he qualified as an accountant, John moved into computing with ICL. He then spent a couple of years in project management with an insurance company before joining the management consultancy division of Coopers and Lybrand. After a few years he became a freelance project manager working predominantly in the NHS.
Personal: John and his wife moved to the Woodbridge area in 1999 and he became a Woodbridge Town Councillor in 2007.
Interests: include playing tennis, golf and snooker.
He was treasurer of Woodbridge Tennis Club for 7 years, is secretary to the Management Committee of Woodbridge Museum and does volunteer work for Suffolk Wildlife Trust. He is a trustee of the newly formed Saxmundham, Woodbridge and Thorpeness Tennis Partnership.
|
 |
Professor Jane Wright
Member of School and Compliance & Quality Assurance
Committees
Jane
was educated at Queen Mary College, University of London (LLB) and The College
of Law.
She
qualified as a solicitor in 1982 having trained at Slaughter & May and
after a career break while her children were of pre school age she returned to
the University of London for a Masters degree in Law. Jane was appointed to a
lectureship at the University of Essex in 1992 and has been a member of the
School of Law since then, specialising in Human Rights Law, on which she has
lectured and written widely.. Her academic interests have frequently taken her
abroad, particularly to the new democracies of Central and Eastern
Europe.
Jane
has served as both the Dean and the Head of the School of Law and in 2011 was
appointed Pro-Vice-Chancellor (Academic Standards) and is also responsible for
the Faculty of Humanities and Comparative Studies at Essex.
|
 |
Martin Sylvester
Member of Care & Grants Committee
Martin’s
career has been spent in the property sector where, since 1990, he has been an
executive director of Churchmanor Estates plc, an Ipswich based property
development and investment company.
He
has been a member of Woodbridge Town Council since 2003, serving as town Mayor
on three occasions and as the chair or vice chair of a number of its
committees. He has a breadth of local experience gained from board membership
of Suffolk Heritage Housing Association, Woodbridge Round Table, Deben Yacht
Club, Deben Valley Young Farmers Club and as a school governor.
|
 |
Martina King
Member of School Committee and chair of its Marketing
Sub-committee
Former
Managing Director of Aurasma, Martina King has an extensive career in media
technology. Her previous leadership roles include Managing Director of Capital
Radio, where she doubled revenues as Sales Director and successfully defended
the radio station’s number one position in London, and Managing
Director for Europe at Yahoo!, where she rebuilt the UK and Ireland business
after the dot com collapse and subsequently led the rebuilding of the European
division. Martina is also non-executive director of Capita Group, Cineworld and
Debenhams and a Trustee of Coram.
|