Double act to take over at Frank Wise

Simon Knight and Heidi Dennison will take over as joint head teachers at Banbury's Frank Wise School in the summer NNL-180220-135229001

It is all change at one special school, after it announced that its retiring headteacher of 11 years is going to be replaced with two new full-time headteachers.

Current Frank Wise School head, Sean O’Sullivan, is retiring this summer after 38 years in education and 11 years as headteacher of the Banbury-based school.

His place is being taken by deputy headteacher Heidi Dennison, and Simon Knight, who was a deputy headteacher at the school previously and who is returning after two years working for two national education think-tanks.

Mrs Dennison said she was ‘absolutely delighted and extremely proud’ to have been appointed joint head.

Mr Knight said: “I’m honoured and excited to be returning to such an extraordinary school as joint headteacher.”

Mr O’Sullivan wished them both well and said: “We know that the core principles we have lived by for more than 30 years as a school are absolutely assured with this combined appointment.”

Mrs Dennison and Mr Knight both have a very long history with the school, starting with their work experience placements.

They became deputy headteachers at the school at the same time, working alongside each other to lead and manage the school for 10 years before Mr Knight left to gain experience working with the National Education Trust and as director of the  whole school SEND Consortium.

Richard Howard, chair of governors at the school, said: “We couldn’t have asked for a better solution to leading the school into the future.”