Our Federation Journey
February 2025
Federation Governors’ Learning Walk at Hague and Stewart Headlam. Secondary and primary committee governors listening to pupils, staff and parents’ voices on the quality of education.
September - December 2024
Governors from Stewart Headlam and Hague Primary Schools and Governors from Swanlea Secondary School consulted parents and staff about a new federation partnership between the three schools.
September 2024 – Alison Goodliffe appointed New Head
Alison Goodliffe, appointed New Head of School at Hague as Sue Walsh retired.
April 2024 – Swanlea Ofsted: OUTSTANDING
January 2024 – Weavers Federation formed
‘Stronger Together’ – There are many excellent benefits of our schools working together with governors and staff. It means we are ‘stronger together through partnership’ more able to face the challenges of running schools successfully. We are the first primary and secondary hard federation in Tower Hamlets. We are weaving strands of our leadership, governance and transition Y6 to Y7 curriculum together so that we shine as outstanding schools, serving the local community.
July 2023 – Stewart Headlam Ofsted: OUTSTANDING
September 2022 – Hague Ofsted: GOOD
September 2022
Established a single site federation nursery class for Stewart Headlam and Hague pupils based at Hague. It has been a great use of our resources and talented teaching teams.
March 2022 – Stewart Headlam Ofsted: GOOD
January 2021
Shared leadership strategy after Cathy retired. One Executive Headteacher – Judy Knappett, formerly Headteacher at Hague working across the two schools with Heads of School; Nilufar Chowdhury at Stewart Headlam and Sue Walsh at Hague. The primary federation partnership and strategic planning helped the schools to address local and national education challenges of falling rolls and education during Covid pandemic years.
Primary Federation and shared leadership helped our schools to be sustainable and address the issue of falling rolls in the west of Tower Hamlets. Stewart Headlam started a journey of transitioning from 2FE to 1FE by 2025.
January 2020 – SHH Federation established
Two primaries hard federated with one shared governing body and two Headteachers; Cathy Gillespie Headteacher at Stewart Headlam and Judy Knappett Headteacher at Hague had a vision of the two schools being, ‘Stronger through partnership’ to provide the best education for our community in challenging times.
