I am proud of my reputation with the whole-school community – headteachers, SLTs, teachers, TAs, parents/carers, pupils and governors. I pride myself on providing personalised advice, support and training, which meet the individual needs of the school, staff and pupils.
Education Improvement Adviser, Dudley LA
Helen is a very effective and supportive school improvement adviser. We have worked together to challenge a variety of schools in Ofsted categories, good schools and outstanding schools.
Helen has an excellent understanding of how to improve progress and attainment including growing and developing senior and subject leader confidence and acquisition of skills to sustain this impact.
Helen has carried out many safeguarding audits, reviews and local authority monitoring visits in schools causing concern. Her judgements are astute and feedback to staff is evaluative, with clear steps for improvement.
Helen has firm but fair approach to school improvement and this has always been well respected by her colleagues and the head teachers and staff that she has advised and supported.
Hawbush Primary, Dudley – Headteacher
Following a series of poor maths results at Hawbush, Helen has worked tirelessly to ensure considerable improvements. Helen has motivated and engaged all staff to raise the quality of teaching in maths, while supporting the implementation of systems to enable improvements.
Helen has carried out a robust evaluation of maths teaching and presented this to SLT and Governors. She has then mentored Senior Leaders to enable clear progession for pupils across all year groups. Helen has also engaged with parents – holding engaging maths workshops and demonstration lessons to help them understand what primary maths is all about.
We can’t thank Helen enough for the great work she has done and would thoroughly recommend her to support schools on an improvement journey. Thank you Helen!
Milking Bank Primary, Milking Bank, Dudley – Headteacher
I have had the pleasure of working with Helen in her capacity as Maths Advisor over the course of the past 6 years. She demonstrates such a passion for Maths which is infectious and enthuses others. Her emotional intelligence and ability to bring out the best with whoever she works with is one of her greatest strengths.
She has delivered high quality training to develop staff knowledge and understanding of mathematics and provided excellent support for our Maths Lead; being instrumental in raising standards and improving outcomes in maths both in my previous and current school.
She expertly delivered ongoing subject leadership support to ensure sustainable mathematical improvement. This included joint monitoring, developing staff and making the SL accountable, improving key aspects of leadership with a focus on increasing accountability – resulting in sustainable change.
I will definitely be inviting Helen back to work with our team!
Thank you Helen!
Milking Bank Primary, Milking Bank, Dudley – Subject Leader
I have thoroughly enjoyed working alongside Helen; the advice and support she has given has enabled me to develop as a subject leader and thus impacted on the teaching and learning of maths within our school. Her breadth and depth of knowledge, alongside her willingness to tailor advice to that of our school, has enabled us to create a clear direction for maths over the next few years which she continues to support us with. Thank you.
Newfield Park Primary, Halesowen, Dudley – Headteacher
Helen worked with us at Newfield for over eight years. During that time she supported our teachers through:
– Practical staff meetings
– Parental workshops
– Assessment frameworks
– 1:1 support, observations and team teaching
– Work around coverage and progression
– Problem solving
She supported leaders with:
– Work trawls
– Planning progression
– Age related expectations
– Change in curriculum
– Data analysis, trends and comparisons
We found her to be very supportive, knowledgeable and approachable, our maths books are unrecognisable from when she first started working with us and standards have risen throughout school.
As a result of a changing role she has developed skills in other areas, completing research in her own time in order to deliver the best possible support and advice to the schools she works with. The areas of Safeguarding and Anti-bullying are two that come to mind.
As a school we would highly recommend Helen as a consultant, her professional and approachable demeanour, and knowledge base would be of benefit to any school.
Rufford Primary, Stourbridge, Dudley – Headteacher
Rufford Primary School worked with Helen for a number of years, mainly in her capacity as Maths advisor. She oversaw the introduction of our “Messy Maths” sessions, a daily opportunity for children to apply their maths skills and numeracy understanding in a practical and fun way. This has led to greater independence and resilience for the children and has been held up as good practice in Dudley LA. Helen also worked closely with our maths subject leader to develop progression documents. She has always been flexible and responsive to the changing needs of the staff, children and school.
Helen was a source of great support and advice, and she has a wealth of experience throughout the Primary phase.
I would recommend her without hesitation!
St. Bernadette’s Catholic Primary, Wombourne, Staffordshire – Headteacher
I worked with Helen whilst leading maths in a Dudley school. She proved invaluable in helping me in my role so I made sure I used her services during my 2 headships in Staffordshire. Helen’s support, advice and clear approach to effective Maths teaching has again led to great improvement in the teaching and learning of this subject. The INSET she delivered to my staff was extremely well received and staff commented on how it was helpful in planning, teaching and assessing Maths. I would recommend her services without reserve.
Thorns Primary, Brierley Hill, Dudley – Headteacher
Helen gave excellent support to the subject leader for Mathematics when the school was judged to be “requires improvement” by Ofsted. HMI recognised the impact of her support.
She worked with the Maths leader to carry out a whole school audit of lessons and books and supported him to develop the percentage of good/outstanding teaching.
Helen supported the leader to deliver a parental workshop on the calculation policy and this received very positive parental feedback.
Helen met with governors to present the Maths Action Plan with the subject leader.
Helen supported the whole school to improve opportunities for pupils to develop reasoning and problem solving skills – including introducing Messy Maths.
Withymoor Primary, Brierley Hill, Dudley – Headteacher
I have worked with Helen Owens at a number of schools over the last ten years, and most recently at my current school where I am Headteacher. Helen has the relevant skills, knowledge and experience to support school improvement in a variety of settings with different needs. In partnership with Senior Leadership, Helen is able to quickly identify the priorities of a school and tailors her support accordingly by offering staff training, planning support, curriculum development, team teaching and coaching for middle leaders in areas such as the monitoring of teaching and learning and action planning. At my current school, Helen has had a positive impact on teacher confidence, subject knowledge and pedagogy as she has helped to unpick, diagnose and address barriers to success in mathematics. I have no hesitation in recommending Helen’s expertise should your school need extra support.
