The Staff

There is a part-time Director and a full-time Administrator. The organisation also has eight part-time core tutors, five casual supply tutors and a team of volunteers. Its bookkeeper, Sue Hutter, comes from the A1 group of companies based in Kidlington, Oxon.

Jayne Lacny, Director

Jayne Lacny joined Reading Quest in January 2011, having worked for the charity as a tutor/manager seven years previously. A journalist by trade, Jayne has been in the field of education for the last 15 years and during that time she has devoted herself to helping the disadvantaged improve their skills in literacy and numeracy. After a spell helping children through the Reading Quest programme, she worked in Adult Learning, exploring the difficulties adults had with basic skills, and later managed a department for an early years’ charity. Jayne believes that Reading Quest’s work is life changing for pupils and is always delighted to hear from people who would like to support such a dynamic cause.

Maria Smith, Administrator

Maria Smith joined Reading Quest in November 2011, having briefly volunteered for the charity. Whilst studying for her Bachelors and Masters degrees, Maria devoted most of her spare time volunteering for various charities. She is passionate about encouraging greater family support in childhood learning, having previously project managed an award winning voluntary project with similar aims in Sheffield. Maria has also spent much time promoting localism through working with the directors of a national organisation to promote the Sustainable Communities Act. Maria is glad to be working with such an inspirational charity and is keen to see Reading Quest grow and develop further.

The Core Tutors

Julie Attwood

Julie started working for Reading Quest as a Core Tutor in 2008, after working as a volunteer. She trained as a secondary school teacher but it was while working in primary schools that she first became aware of the difficulties some children face with the early stages of reading and writing. I realised that the Reading Quest approach could help these children in ways that other interventions could not – by working one-to-one with each child, developing their strengths and interests and building a relationship with their family.

Julie says it is a privilege to work with children who are so enthusiastic and eager to learn and a delight to see the progress they make over the course of their lessons. She has been inspired to want to find out more about how early literacy skills are acquired and has completed further studies at Oxford Brookes University. She believes there is still more to learn though, and mostly from the children themselves!

Rosie Fairfax-Cholmeley

Rosie Fairfax-Cholmeley is a practising artist and writer, who also produces hand-bound, illustrated books with Flagstone Press. She has an abiding interest in history and the natural world, and has always worked with children both in schools and through activities outside school. Rosie very much enjoys bringing the enthusiasm she has for storytelling to the work she carries out for Reading Quest, and appreciates Reading Quest’s open structure, so that it really can be adapted to the individual needs of the child.

Jenny Ray

Jenny has been working as a children’s speech and language therapist for more than two years. This has involved working with children in pre-school clinics, nurseries, primary schools, specialist speech and language units, and secondary schools. The client group was extremely diverse from children who have difficulties pronouncing particular sounds, to children who have severely disordered language skills, to children with a stammer, to children who are on the autistic spectrum and have difficulties with social interaction. Having experienced communication difficulties from the spoken language perspective, Jenny is interested in looking behind the theory in terms of the correlation between spoken and written language difficulties.

Anna Chamcham

Anna trained in TEFL after university and taught English in UK, India and Africa. Then she worked for the Triangle Arts Trust Charity for 12 years co-ordinating international artist’s workshops in southern, east and west Africa as well as setting up an international residency programme at the Gasworks Studios in London. Having been working voluntarily at St Ebbe’s School, Oxford where she has been reading and writing with 5 – 7 year olds for 2 years, Reading Quest felt a natural development not least because she felt passionately about the importance of literacy for both children and adults in today’s world. Since training in January 2011, she has found the work rewarding, challenging and enjoyable.

Mona Sakr

Mona developed a passion for teaching while studying Experimental Psychology at Balliol College, Oxford University. She volunteered for the educational charity, Jacari (www.jacari.org), which provides one-on-one tuition to local children who do not speak English as their first language, and after graduating with 1st class honours, she became the charity’s first full-time co-ordinator. Later, she trained as a secondary school teacher of English and worked in a challenging school in West London while completing a part-time Masters at the Institute of Education in the history of education. She is completing the first year of a PhD at Oxford Brookes University, looking at the way in which new technologies are integrated by children into their everyday literacy practices.

Ann Carroll

Ann qualified as a social worker in the 1970s and worked in local authorities with families and in the voluntary sector resettling homeless people. While bringing up her daughter, she took a degree with the Open University with a music specialism. Returning to full-time work, she changed direction and has worked for the last 10 years in primary schools supporting children with literacy. As a Higher Level Teaching Assistant (HLTA), she was a subject leader for music and teaches class music. She also teaches piano privately.

Sue Thorp

Sue has worked with the Skills for Life (SfL) team in Oxford for more than 10 years as a volunteer, a tutor and a manager teaching English and maths to people from 16 to 70-plus. She has seen the barriers faced by adults who leave school without essential skills and the positive changes they can make to their lives when they have these skills and can start to fulfil their potential. The role that literacy plays in a person’s life chances is well documented and she believes that every child has the right to learn these skills while they are at school. Some children will need more support than others for a whole range of reasons. She relishes working with these children and giving their parents the confidence to become more involved in their children’s education.

Teresa Garlake

Teresa was attracted to Reading Quest due to her work as a teacher in a local primary school, she I knew it worked! She feels passionately that children’s learning can really take off when they have confidence in themselves, and Reading Quest helps to do this. Teresa has been teaching for the past six years but before that she worked as a writer and producer of international education materials for a number of larger charities, including Oxfam and Save the Children. She has always loved sharing books with children (and have a few of her own written stories that have yet to see the light of day). Her favourite younger children’s author is John Burningham and she often read poetry, particularly by Michael Rosen, to the young children she taught.

Saskia Been

Saskia has worked in the field of education for more than 20 years and has gained wide experience in a number of countries. As an early childhood teacher, she has greatly enjoyed introducing children to the wonders of the world around them through the written word. While some children can start to confidently grasp the concepts and meanings of words others find this more difficult, often leading to insecurities which can affect their wider academic and social achievements. Saskia has particular interests and skills in working with such children and she is glad to be part of the Reading Quest programme.