Roger Rowett works independently but also provides services together with a number of other consultants and companies. All the consultants work on an independent basis. This 'association' delivers a flexible package of options for clients who wish to benefit from the range of expertise and experience on offer. All the associates have experience of working together and providing solutions in a creative and responsive manner.

Associates
Laraine Bruce - Dan Grant - Barrie Grant - Garth Higginbotham - Nia Higginbotham - Marilyn McCarron - Roger Rowett

RateUs Ltd - Masmedia Ltd

Roger Rowett has worked for a range of organisations within the voluntary, statutory and private sectors over a 30 year period. Most recently he worked as a Workforce Development Officer for the Care Council for Wales, an HMI for Estyn (Education and Training Inspectorate for Wales), and Professional Advisor for Children's Services within the Care Standards Inspectorate for Wales (CSIW). He still works as an AI (Additional Inspector) for Estyn within adult community learning, work based training, and youth (YPP).

Roger originally qualified as a teacher, going on to work as a youth and community worker for the YMCA. He spent 10 years with the YMCA managing a number of projects including an advice and counselling centre for young people and a youth training scheme. Roger's work experience has mostly centred on projects which support young people and vulnerable adults, this has included advocacy work. Much of his work has been related to supporting people with a learning disability. This has included coordinating a county wide forum for service users, carers and voluntary organisations.

Roger has also worked for an Internet company and designed information management systems for a wide range of clients within local government in Wales, England and Scotland.

Roger is Married with two daughters and lives in North Wales. He has also studied Aikido for 25 years and enjoys cycling and walking.

For more details about Roger, his experience, and recommendations click here.

Barrie Grant has extensive experience as an educator and trainer in further, adult and community education spanning 34 years. This includes a 15 year period as Director of Teacher Training and Professional Development in a large FE college in North Wales which now has the best Estyn inspection grade profile in Wales.

Central to Barrie's approach is the belief that creativity, innovation, experimentation and reflection are at the heart of all effective learning, whether it be at individual, group or organisational levels. He engenders lively learning environments that foster active learning

Over the last few years Barrie has been working as an independent consultant and has completed the following work:

'First Steps to Community Development Learning - this experimental programme under the aegis of NIACE dysgu cymru is aimed at adults within the community who want to gain accreditation for work carried out on community activities and projects. The project involved consultation with experts in the field, guiding it through rigorous accreditation procedures, training the trainers and co-authoring a manual for trainers.

Additional Inspector with Estyn - this has included area inspections in Adult and Community Learning and Work-based training.

Supporting Change - this project involved running workshops for an FE college going through a period of organisational change and development

Creativity Workshops - run for CENTRA, a national training organisations, these workshops were aimed at encouraging trainers to access their creativity and take risks!

Barrie has two sons and a daughter of whom he is very proud. He has eclectic interests including: golf, hill-walking, amateur dramatics/operatics, gardening, motor-cycling, bird-watching, listening to classical and jazz music, fishing etc…

Marilyn McCarron is an An experienced Monitoring Officer, Returning Officer and Manager in the public sector originally with a background in social services, town and country planning, human resources and training. Marilyn is a solicitor and trained mediator with a demonstrable track record in conflict management, training, organisational development and investigative work. A Consultant with transferable and highly desirable skills, with the flexibility and experience to apply them in a variety of contexts. Marilyn is enthusiastic and has excellent interpersonal skills.

Prior to taking early retirement in April 2005, Marilyn had 31 years of experience in the public sector at County Councils, a Unitary Authority and District Councils. She has had 15 years experience as a senior manager, the last five of which were at Chief Officer level. She has been called upon to speak at road shows and annual conferences of the Standards Board for England and the Association of Councils' Secretaries and Solicitors on matters of conduct. Marilyn is now an independent mediator and trainer and undertakes a variety of investigative work.

Key Career Achievements

• Direct responsibility for investigating major allegations of breaches of financial regulations and standing orders raised by the Audit Commission. The investigation led to Marilyn producing a Monitoring Officer's report which recommended a major restructure in the authority concerned resulting in financial savings and a much higher level of probity
• Developed Oswestry Borough Council's Constitution and associated Rules, Procedures and Protocols in order to adhere to the government's modernisation agenda. Marilyn trained both officers and members prior to the development of the Constitution and following its adoption so as to ensure a thorough understanding and appreciation of the necessary changes to the political decision making process. She also developed and managed a fair and balanced public consultation process
• Developed and led a members' modernisation working group to address the government's modernisation agenda which resulted in a sense of "ownership" amongst the politicians and a much improved working relationship between officers and members
• Investigated and represented a council in a high profile child sex abuse case which attracted the attention of the press, television and radio. Thirteen children were taken into care with a view to adoption as a result.
• Initiated and introduced a new corporate complaints procedure which resulted in a structured and streamlined approach to the handling of complaints across the authority concerned. The local community now has a well managed mechanism for reporting complaints and improvements to services are reported on a regular basis through the Bulletins and Newsletters also introduced by Marilyn which appear on the council's website
• Designed and introduced a "Members' Handbook" which together with Marilyn's innovative methods of training ensures that new and existing members are fully equipped to carry out their various roles both within the community and the council.

Consultancy Assignments

Marilyn has carried out numerous investigations into allegations regarding councillors' breaches of the Code of Conduct and has designed and presented training sessions, including mock hearings for many councils. She has undertaken mediation and team building for senior managers at District and Unitary councils and has chaired an appeal at Director level for the Countryside Council for Wales. Marilyn has also recently provided cover for the Head of Legal and Democratic Services at a Shropshire authority.

Educational and Professional Qualifications

Solicitors' Finals (Commendation), The College of Law Christleton, 1984 Fellow of the Institute of Legal Executives, Chester College and Correspondence course, 1986

Marilyn is married with one daughter and her hobbies are amateur dramatics, walking, cycling and reading

TOP

Nia Higginbotham has worked for both statutory, voluntary and community organisations over a 30 year period, and has set up three projects, the most recent being a community organising charity.

She gained her postgraduate degree in Social Administration and Social Work, qualifying as a psychiatric social worker. She worked as a social worker in Glasgow, and then as a social work manager in both residential and fieldwork settings in Northern Ireland. She then became a community worker, working particularly with vulnerable young people and single parents, helping them set up and run community ventures such as playgroups and credit unions.

After training as a community organiser in the US she set up the only community organising charity in Wales. This work entailed bringing a range of faith and community groups together to work on the issues which concerned them in their communities. The issues dealt with included drugs, policing, environmental and regeneration issues. The key to the work was the leadership training provided, enabling people to find their voice, and use it to secure community, as well as personal, change.

She has taught on social work courses and for the Open University; the courses included sociology, social policy, social work, women's studies and social care. Latterly she has devised a course enabling volunteers and statutory workers to work more effectively together.

Throughout her passion has been to find ways of empowering individuals to take charge of their lives, and to make democratic processes more real at grassroots.

She is married, with three sons. She is a native Welsh speaker.

TOP

Garth Higginbotham - Garth's docorate is in Physics, and he lectured in the subject at the New University of Ulster, before deciding that teaching was his passion, rather than the research demanded. He obtained a certificate in adult teaching, and became a teacher. He has experience of teaching in both private and state schools, as well as some years retraining teachers of physics. During this period he also marked papers for a variety of examination Boards, and became an examination setter at A level.

He spent 15 years as an ESTYN HMI, during which time he inspected a growing range of subjects, inspecting primary and secondary schools as well as local education authorities. Latterly he helped devise the self-assessment scheme for schools, trained Inspectors and helped set up the inspection regime for private schools.

Now retired, he has set up a consultancy in education and training, and has led secondary school inspections through the medium of Welsh, and provided consultancy for schools on their assessment procedures.

He is married with three sons. He is a fluent Welsh speaker.

Dan Grant is an experienced trainer and consultant in social work, education and training and criminal justice. This has included designing and implementing a multi-agency partnership quality assurance framework on behalf of Greenwich Children's Services. A feasibility study for the implementation of circles of support and accountability in the north of England. Inspection advice to schools, colleges and work based learning providers on quality, performance and self evaluation.

Dan is a risk assessor for prisons and probation. This involves application of the following structured professional judgement tools to the assessment of dangerousness and risk presented by violent offenders: PCL-R, HCR-20, SAM, SARA B-safer and Thornton's Risk Matrix 2000-07.

Dan is also a registered inspector of education and training for Ofsted and Estyn. This involves regular inspections of colleges, work based training for adults and Job Centre Plus programmes.

As a part-time senior lecturer in criminology in higher education, Dan teaches a combined unit for psychology and criminology undergraduates in clinical criminology.

Dan is an independent international social work consultant and trainer. This is occasional work when required. His last commission was to assess for an inter-country fostering arrangement. He is registered with the British Association of Social Workers and as an expert witness.

He is a reviewer of book proposals for Taylor Francis (Routeledge) international publisher of professional texts.

Dan is Chief Executive of New Leaf Trust. This is a new project in partnership with the University of Hull delivering Circles of Support and Accountability. What is unique about the Circles operated by New Leaf Trust is that they begin involvement with sex offenders using a thorough review of existing risk assessment and management information and then apply relevant structured professional judgement tools considered necessary.

In addition, Dan is Managing Director of Brain Box Health and Social Care. This is a new community interest company providing support, information and mentoring to 14-16 year old vocational learners in health and social care. The project is unique and is subject to intellectual property and brand patenting legislation.

Laraine Bruce MBE - Laraine began her professional career, after obtaining an Honours Degree in Fine Art, followed by a post-graduate teaching qualification. This provided the foundation for the last 30 years of her work. Laraine believes that each person has a unique contribution to make and that the richness and variety of these contributions are to be celebrated and respected.

Following several years teaching, in a range of educational settings, Laraine moved to North Wales in 1978 and, in partnership with her husband, established a Study Centre for Art and the Countryside. The Centre provided opportunities for children and adults to experience life outside of traditional educational and care environments. This period cemented Laraine's view that unique solutions can be found by adopting creative and problem-solving approaches. During these years running the Centre, Laraine and her husband became foster parents. She also began her work with people with Learning Disabilities in various organisations within both the voluntary, private and statutory sectors.

More recently Laraine worked as an Inspector within the Care Standards Inspectorate for Wales (CSIW).

Throughout the last 30 years Laraine has acted as an independent advocate for young people, vulnerable adults and in support of families of people with Learning Disabilities. In 2001 she received an M.B.E. for services to people with Learning Disabilities in Wales.

Laraine currently works as an independent consultant and trainer. Most of her training is in the field of Learning Disability and focuses on a Person Centred way of thinking and working.

Laraine is married with four adult children and lives in North Wales.

TOP