Meet the Governors
City Lit's Governing Body has up to 21 members.
With skills and expertise in a wide range of professions, Governors are responsible for determining the educational character and mission of City Lit and for monitoring quality and performance. They oversee the college's activities, including the effective and efficient use of resources, and ensure the safeguarding of its assets. Governors also act as trustees and company directors.
The Board operates a board structure with committees as follows:
- Audit & Risk Committee
- Finance & Commercial Committee
- Governance & People Committee
- Quality Committee
- Remuneration Committee.
Please contact the Director of Governance, Katrina O'Sullivan, who will be happy to help with any governance questions you may have.
We encourage you to read our City Lit Governors Code of Conduct which is a guide to indicate the standards of conduct and accountability which are expected of Governors.
Lindsay Nicholson MBE — Chair of Governors
Lindsay Nicholson gained a BSc (Hons) in Astrophysics at UCL – but turned down a career, literally as a rocket scientist, after winning a place on Mirror Group Newspapers Training Scheme. After training as a reporter, she moved into magazines becoming editor initially of Prima, then for over 18 years as editor of of Good Housekeeping, which under her leadership became the biggest-selling monthly magazine in Britain. She was twice named Editor of the Year, honoured with a Lifetime Achievement Award from the British Society of Magazine Editors and became the first Editorial Director of The National Magazine Company overseeing some of the most famous magazine brands in Britain including Cosmopolitan, Harper’s Bazaar and Esquire. As well as spear-heading campaigns for more family-friendly workplaces, she used her early experiences studying a STEM subject to campaign for Women In Science. In 2005 she published a memoir, Living On The Seabed, about the deaths of her first husband and eldest child from a rare form of leukaemia. In 2017, she gave up editing to concentrate on writing, coaching and campaigning. She was awarded the MBE in 2018, in recognition of services to journalism and equal opportunities.
Course of choice would be: as an inveterate bookworm and would-be novelist...it has to be Bookbinding For Beginners.
Hayley White — Governor
As the Assessment Director at Pearson, Hayley is responsible for the assessment of all Pearson Edexcel GCEs, GCSEs and International qualifications, which sees over 12,000 teacher examiners determine more than 5 million learner results each summer. Her remit extends from the strategic management and operational delivery of all assessment activities from the creation of question papers to the setting of grade boundaries. Hayley has a proven track record of excellent operational delivery; ensuring – without exception – 100% completion of delivery activities within a highly regulated environment. She has extensive experience of organisational development, change management, and maximising business development opportunities. Hayley is responsible for supporting teachers in their understanding of the assessment approach - ultimately ensuring confidence in student results.
Course of choice would be: Ceramics: throwing and decoration.
Edward Breen — Staff Governor
Edward teaches music history and music theory at City lit where he is Head of Programme for Advanced Studies in the School of Performing Arts. His specialism is early music (medieval, renaissance and baroque periods) and he holds a PhD at King's College London (2013) on the performance of medieval music.
Previously Edward has taught music at Morley College and English for Itaú bank in São Paulo, Brazil. Outside of teaching, Edward is a regular contributor to Gramophone magazine and has also worked for the BBC Proms. His most recent essays are published in: The Cambridge Encyclopaedia of Historical Performance in Music, and The Oxford Handbook of Music and Medievalism.
Course of choice would be: Portuguese Level 4.
Clancy Gebler Davies — Governor
Clancy is an artist and writer. Her work has been exhibited at the Photographers' Gallery, the Royal Academy of Arts and the East Wing of the Courtauld Institute. She began her career as a journalist and wrote for several national newspapers. Attracted by City Lit's reputation for teaching literary skills, Clancy's first course was Ways into Creative Writing in 2012. "I have learned so much and had so much encouragement from City Lit tutors," she says. "So many of them are experts in their fields who generously share decades of knowledge. The photography department gave me the technical skills and confidence to concentrate on my work as an artist. I would never have shown at the Photographers' Gallery without their support and encouragement.”
Course of choice would be: Introduction to basketry
"I did a taster course in basket-making just for fun and I could see straight away why people come to City Lit from all over the UK and Europe to learn this skill here. It was very satisfying."
Colin Jones — Governor
Colin Jones was Finance Director of Euromoney Institutional Investor PLC, where he worked in leadership roles for 22 years before retiring in June 2018. During his time at Euromoney, Colin’s responsibilities included oversight of the group’s public training activities across sectors including banking and finance, legal, audit and information security; buying, selling and investing in training businesses; management of the group’s internal training programme, and even writing and delivering training courses himself. Prior to joining Euromoney, Colin was a Director at Price Waterhouse, where he qualified as a chartered accountant. Colin is also a non-executive director of Centaur Media Plc.
Course of choice would be: starting next year, I plan to learn German, and where better than City Lit. Before that I will try a course in linguistics, and might even dabble in Welsh.
Dr Paula Franklin — Governor
Paula studied medicine at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital in London and went on to practice in the UK and Barbados. After studying public health at Johns Hopkins in the US she moved into healthcare management where she spent the rest of her career. While in America she worked for the Children’s Defence Fund charity advocating for better healthcare for young people. Paula later held a number of roles at Bupa and worked for Marie Stopes International gaining a broad, first hand experience of healthcare and health systems in many countries across the world.
Throughout her career she has been passionate about the delivery of accessible high quality healthcare. She is a trustee of the Youth Sport Trust and a board member of Spectrum.Life, a digital healthcare company. With a love of learning, over the years Paula has been a student of many things including Egyptology, pattern cutting, counselling, ethics and music.
Course of choice: The Essential History of Jazz in 20 cuts.
Christine Kinnear — Governor
Christine is the Founder & CEO of With Insight Education C.I.C., a not-for-profit organisation that she set up in 2018 to increase the number of black-heritage pupils progressing to top ranked universities as a gateway to a more prosperous future. Her background is as a social marketing practitioner with 18 years’ experience of strategic marketing, programme management and driving organisational change in not-for-profit organisations.
Previously Chair of Governors of a primary school, Christine now sits on several other educational and diversity boards including Causeway Education and the AccessHE BAME forum.
Course of choice would be: debating.
Mark Lever OBE — Governor
Mark is Chief Executive of Helpforce, a charity focussed on accelerating the growth and impact of volunteering in health and care. He is a Chartered Accountant with a Cranfield MBA. The first 13 years of his career were spent training and practising as a Chartered Accountant, he then decided to leave the heady world of finance and take a bungee jump into the third sector - a decision he has not regretted for a single minute of his 27+ years in the sector. During this time he has been Chief Executive of the RVS and the National Autistic Society. He is now leading Helpforce to work in partnership with health and care organisations who want to accelerate the growth and impact of their volunteering.
In his spare time, he looks ridiculous in lycra cycling at the weekends, cultivates grey hair at an alarming rate, drinks wine with his wife Amanda and regularly negotiates behaviour related pay awards with his four sons.
Course of choice would be: Creative non-fiction writing
Gabriel MacGregor — Governor
Gabriel worked as a public sector lawyer for 30 years. She ended her career as Head of Corporate Law and Deputy Monitoring Officer for the London Borough of Croydon advising local politicians and senior officers on governance issues and strategic projects in relation to one of the most populous and ethnically diverse boroughs in London. Since 2018 Gabriel has been a Lay Member of the University of Kent Council, is a Trustee for a Residential Care Home for the Elderly and a weekly volunteer at the Merton Homeless Drop In.
Course of choice would be: I’d do one of the London History Walks and Courses. I’ve lived in London all my life but there’s always more to learn about it.
Mark Malcomson OBE — Principal and Governor
Mark joined City Lit as Principal having been Director of Executive Education at London Business School. Previously, he was President of the New York Institute of Finance, part of Pearson plc, the world's largest education publishing company.
Course of choice would be: singing, to see if I am really as tone deaf as everyone tells me I am.
Lucy Arnold-Courtney — Governor
Lucy has worked in higher and further education for nearly 20 years. She started as a Politics lecturer for an East Midlands university before shifting her focus to strategically facilitating access to Higher Education and championing Further Education. Lucy is active in governance and support of schools and colleges including being the Chair of Governors for a large single academy trust in Essex and the Trustee of an Awarding Organisation focussed on adult education.
Lucy is currently the Director of a newly established University Centre in East London following her previous role as Director of Continuing Education for university in London. Lucy’s love of further education and its role in society has defined her work within Higher Education and her own personal development as a lifelong learner.
Course of choice: Ceramics
Alison Pike — Governor
Alison works as Director of Communities and Programmes at Mencap, an organisation she has loved being part of for the past 11 years. She is committed to tackling inequalities and social injustice, championing equity so people can live happy, healthy lives. Her current role includes delivering a range of education and training services to support people into the work place and asset based community development to promote strong, thriving communities that enable everyone to achieve their potential. She is also interested in organisational culture and transformation. Prior to Mencap she worked at Deloitte and is a qualified teacher having taught Religious Studies and Psychology for 3 years. City Lit is her first trustee appointment.
Course of choice would be: Arabic, so I can understand what my partner is talking to his family and friends about!
Jill Westerman — Governors
Jill has worked in adult education for over 40 years, beginning her career as a literacy tutor with gypsy and travelling families in the Midlands, going on to teach in London and Yorkshire. She spent 25 years working at the Northern College in Barnsley, with 11 years as principal before she retired in 2018. She worked for the Adult Learning Inspectorate and Ofsted as an additional inspector.
Chris Dearnley — Governors
Chris has over 20 years of experience as a Civil Servant, working extensively across post-16 education. His roles included working for the Department for Education and its agencies on policy, planning, funding, and regulation and with the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority on qualifications regulation. While working in the sector, he completed a Degree in educational quality assurance and a Master’s degree in educational organisation, management, and change. In recent years, he has worked with further education (FE) providers and colleges on quality and financial interventions, and structural change in collaboration with the FE Commissioner. Earlier in his career, Chris played a pivotal role in improving provision and outcomes for offenders through the Offender Learning and Skills Service, working across both prison and probation settings. He works as an Ofsted Inspector, covering the full scope of post-16 education, including prison education.
Before joining the Civil Service, Chris held senior college leadership and teaching positions and worked with several Awarding Organisations, where he was responsible for developing and quality assuring qualifications. He began his career as an Agricultural Engineer, training in the field and working for the tractor manufacturer Massey Ferguson. Since retiring, Chris has been traveling extensively. When not on the move, he continues to work as an inspector and consultant within the post-16 education sector.
Governing Body Meetings
2025/2026 Governing Body meeting dates:
- Tuesday 14 October 2025, 5-7pm
- Tuesday 9 December 2025, 5-7pm
- Monday 9 March 2026, 12-7pm - includes annual strategy session
- Tuesday 12 May 2026, 5-7pm
- Tuesday 7 July 2026, 5-7pm