Sweet smile of new jewel in the crown

Jayne Clarke . . . a steely determination behind her smile

MARTYN MEETS... Jane Clarke, Oldham Sixth Form College principal

JAYNE Clarke is here to stay — and after spending an afternoon in the company of the Oldham Sixth Form College principal I came away with the distinct impression that here is a lady who gets her own way... with a smile.

“I never had a career path mapped out, not really. I always knew I wanted to be a teacher, but I wouldn’t say I am phenomenally ambitious. I work hard and want to be best I can be. It’s more about personal motivation.”

Those sentences were delivered, between mouthfuls of tuna sandwich, in her spacious office at the sprawling campus in Oldham town centre with a quiet, understated intensity that underpinned the whole of our conversation.

For almost 90 minutes Jayne spoke quietly and unambiguously about her life and career and how she became an adopted Oldhamer almost 10 years ago.

Yes, she has been among us for almost a decade, but until the official opening of the quite magnificent Regional Science Centre three weeks ago, we hadn’t met.

We shared lunch and chatted amiably about her life and times and how she came to succeed the charismatic Nick Brown as principal of Oldham’s jewel in an increasingly bejwelled educational crown.

Jayne manages to make the succession sound almost accidental, but there is an inner core of strength about this 40-year-old mother of two that belies her charming exterior.

An only child, she was born in Blackpool, from where her father’s banking career took her through Chester and Parbold and eventually across England to Basingstoke, where she attended Cranbourne School.

“For ladies?” I asked. “Comprehensive,” she responded.

Maybe her mother being a teacher had a bearing on her devotion to study and on her career path.

Jayne was a model student, with ‘O’ levels in English, French, history, maths, sociology, physics and chemistry and two years at sixth-form college — which she describes as “brilliant experience” — saw her add A-levels in English, economics and sociology.

Her formative years at the sixth form college on the borders of Hampshire and Surrey have shaped her career and her view of educational life. She is utterly committed to Oldham Sixth Form College, and has been since the day of her interview to become vice principal to Nick Brown.

At the time Jayne was working at Ridge Danyers College in Stockport and, in her own words, was “loving it”.

She had taken time to gain a Masters degree through the Open University and had come home — “I consider myself a northerner” — when husband Neil took a job in Stockport. Jayne’s qualifications meant she found a job with relative ease and she became a tutor in psychology.

She was soon involved in setting up a cross-college assessment system and so her career in educational management was launched.

“I never really had a career path mapped out, I just loved teaching, but after working at Ridge Danyers and on that first step in management I decided this was the career for me.”

Seeing the advertisement in The Times Educational Supplement for a vice principal, Jayne put together her application, and decided she was coming to town.

There were several interviews involving Nick and the-then chair of governors, Gloria Oates, but Jayne recalls her first tour of the facilities and being wowed by just about everything.

She told me: “Everything had such a positive impact; there was a real buzz about the place, among the students and the staff.”

Six people were interviewed, she recalls, as there were five interviews so the process was thorough. But Gloria, Nick, the governors and certainly Oldham got it right: when Nick announced he was leaving Jayne threw her hat into the ring to succeed him.

The interviews were just as intense and though there was only one other candidate — a man who has since gone on to head his own sixth form college elsewhere — Jayne was left sweating on the decision before she took the call.

It is a task she has taken in her considerable stride. The change has been seamless and the Sixth Form College goes from strength to strength.

“I saw this as an opportunity to widen the scope of my responsibilities, a move to the next level.”

All this from a northern lass who now lives in Yorkshire, was educated in Basingstoke and read her degree in Canterbury.

At the University of Kent she read social and educational psychology — and got a 1st — and soon she was in the wonderful world of work.

At this point the Jayne Clarke masterplan goes a little awry. Her plans to support primary students with learning and behavioural difficulties, hence her dogged pursuit of educational pschology excellence and understanding, went by the wayside when she began teaching sixth formers.

“It was such a wonderful experience, I enjoyed teaching immensely, I still do and I miss that daily teaching contact with young people,” she admitted in a moment of candour.

That isn’t to say that Jayne was less than forthcoming with me, she was a compelling and willing interviewee but I suspect that few people outside of her close family, husband Neil and sons Scott and Nathan, get to see the real Jayne Clarke.

Outside of her time-consuming duties in charge of 2,300 16 to 18-year-olds in what is virtually an inner-city environment — a lasting tribute to those of who conceived the idea 20 years ago in the face of mounting criticism — Jayne is a devoted parent.

Her car becomes Mum’s Taxi most evenings and weekends ferrying her boys to football, football and more football in and around Holmfirth, where the Clarke family has settled.

Neil, an IT project manager whom she met at university, works in Yorkshire and the Yorkshire village made famous by the BBC series “Last of the Summer Wine” is a serene oasis betwixt their two places of employment where, I suspect, they will grow old.

With a grace that befits such a beguiling lady.