Our Staff Team

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Introducing our Head Teacher - Louise Reeks

For the last 17 years, Louise Reeks has supported children and young people with special educational needs (SEN). During this time, she has worked with some of the most incredible young people who have been able to share their insight into their challenges. This has enabled Louise to provide and direct a highly dynamic and responsive approach which benefits everyone and achieves positive outcomes.

Over the last two years, Louise has worked with young people and staff as the Head Teacher for one of Priory’s Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) schools.

Now the Head Teacher at Priory Lodge School, Louise is delighted to be working with such a knowledgeable and dedicated staff team. Together, they are wholly committed to creating a safe and nurturing environment, in which individuals are empowered to achieve their full potential.

Our Staff Team

Priory Lodge School is led by a strong Senior Management Team with over 20 years’ experience of working with children with autism. Our dedicated and caring staff team of over 60 people is at the heart of Priory Lodge School’s success.

The staff at Priory Lodge School are highly knowledgeable autism educators, with a wealth of specialised experience and training. They re-engage our children and young people with learning and provide the support they need to achieve and progress academically, socially and emotionally. Our team motto is ‘never stop trying’ and we are committed to implementing new ideas, concepts, and environments to ensure that we make a difference for our students.

“Teachers know their pupils’ individual needs well, both the academic and the personal and social. They tailor the approaches they use to help pupils make good progress.”

Priory Lodge School Ofsted Report

A dedicated and specialist team

Every class has a qualified specialist Teacher, supported by a highly skilled and experienced team including Teaching Assistants. Our committed and creative staff build trusting and caring relationships with the young people that make them feel safe and valued at school.

Our in-house expert therapy team includes a Speech and Language Therapist, an Occupational Therapist, Counsellor and Mentor and Wellbeing Lead. All teaching staff have been trained to integrate therapy into daily lessons and work closely with our therapy team, who plan and oversee this. The pastoral team support the attendance, punctuality, behaviour and the general welfare of pupils, and lead on the positive behaviour support approach followed by the school.

Priory Lodge School undertakes rigorous safeguarding checks for all newly appointed staff. The professional development of our team is promoted by access to the comprehensive and continually updated training programme we access as part of Priory Education and Children’s Services, one of the UK’s leading specialist education providers. This includes regular training on autistic spectrum disorders (ASD), complex special educational needs and education, enabling our team to learn from best practice, continually updating their knowledge so students benefit from innovative and effective new approaches at school.

Staff build strong relationships with the local authorities and professionals supporting our students, to facilitate the best possible outcomes. They work in partnership with families providing weekly updates on progress and regularly consulting on next steps. All have an understanding of the impact that having a child with autism can have on families.

“Leaders review teaching regularly and evaluate its impact on the quality of learning. They use the information from this to help to plan the programme of staff development, for example the recent work on ‘autism friendly’ teaching. This helps equip staff with the skills they need to enable their pupils and students to make good progress.”

Priory Lodge School Ofsted Report

“The teachers here are really nice and they help me with a lot of things. Before, I couldn’t cook because I never really tried, but now with the help of the teachers I can cook different foods which is a good life skill.”

Student at Priory Lodge School

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