WISE partnered with the Festival of Education, one of the biggest education events in the UK, on June 21-22, 2018.

The festival hosted more than 4000 participants, hundreds of speakers and dozens of sessions. A diverse number of sessions were hosted in the WISE tent which was one of the main venues in the event. The sessions tanged in focus including topics such as teacher motivation, approaches to educating children with autism, the role of testing in today’s national curricula, and the state of schooling for refugee youth. The discussions featured some speakers from the WISE community, including Jo Harding, Manager of Doc Academy, one of the four projects of the WISE Accelerator 2017-2018; and Aldo De Pape, who was part of WISE Accelerator 2015-16 with Teach Pitch. Additionally, Karen Guldberg, professor at the University of Birmingham, presented her research on “Meeting the Needs of Pupils with Autism in Qatar: Moving Forward,” and how it can be applied to the education of young people with autism in the UK.

The Festival was started nine years ago by Wellington College headmaster and political biographer Anthony Seldon, who wrote best-selling books on Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. For the past three years it has been organised and run by Schools Week, the leading UK education newspaper.

At the heart of the Festival of Education is an understanding that learning should be inspiring and fun. From challenging debates to inspiring headliners and from sun bathing to making new friends – the Festival of Education is where those who inspire find their own inspiration.