How Ark's governance works
Every school in the Ark network is the legal responsibility of the Ark Schools Board. This board focuses on statutory duties and delegates most day-to-day responsibilities to each school’s individual Local Governing Body (LGB).
This means that our Academy's governors are able to concentrate on the things that really matter – educational strategy, school outcomes and aspiration.
The Ark Schools Decision Making Framework outlines where responsibility and accountability sits for the key functional areas within Ark Schools between the ‘tiers’ of governance.
Our Local Governing Body
Our Local Governing Body (LGB) is made up of 6-10 members – usually people with a local connection or interest who are committed to supporting educational opportunity in the area. The board generally includes:
- Academy Principal
- Up to two Parent Governors
- One Teaching Staff Governor
- One Non-teaching Staff Governor
- One Local Authority representative
We aim to create a balanced group that will have the right skills, connections and dynamic for the LGB to work well and support the school in achieving exceptional performance. Attributes we look for include:
- Good insight into the specific challenges at the school and the general challenges of operating top-quality schools
- Excellent community links
- Specific skills as needed by/relevant to the school
- A link to the senior executive team of Ark Schools
All appointments are made by the Director of Governance for Ark Schools. The term of a governor is three years, except for the Principal, who remains a governor for the duration of his or her time in post. Governors may be reappointed for further terms.
The LGB meets four times a year.
Becoming a governor
If you have an interest and commitment to improving education, and would like to make a difference within your community, please register your interest in becoming a governor by completing our online Governor Application Form. If you have any questions about a governor’s role or responsibilities please contact us at governance.team@arkonline.org
A full programme of induction, training and support is provided. You can see more information, including role specifications here.
Contacting the governors
The Clerk to the Governors is Alleisha Furlonge-Royal (Alleisha.Furlonge-Royal@arkonline.org). Please contact them if you have any governance-related queries, or would like to contact one of the governors.
Our Governors
Maria Ancupova
Maria has earned both a Master’s in International Political Economy and BSc in Management Sciences from the London School of Economics. Upon graduating in 2011 she joined AKO Capital as an investment analyst, becoming a partner in 2016. She strongly believes that every child should have access to great education, regardless of their background, and thoroughly enjoyed working with children through a number of volunteer projects in London and Riga. She supports ARK’s mission to transform children’s lives through education, and is very keen to contribute to the academy through her professional and personal experiences.
Luba Chudnovets
Luba has a BSc in Accounting and Finance and MSc in Economic History from the LSE. She worked as a management consultant across multiple multinational companies in several different countries and industries. She then joined a 30-person company to build a bank that later became known as Monzo bank, where she scaled operations and built multiple products. She is currently a Senior Product manager at Samsara - a company specialising on the internet of things. She believes that although talent is equally distributed, opportunity is not, but that everyone deserves a chance to achieve great things. This is why she’s keen to support and contribute to ARK’s mission of transforming children’s lives through education.
Mohit Doshi
Mohit Doshi has been with Ark Schools for a little over three years but has been within the Education Sector for almost 8 years and is very passionate about working towards reducing the socio-economic gap within Education. He is a qualified accountant with over 12 years of post qualification experience in various sectors including Banking, Pharmaceuticals, Fashion Retail and Education.
Christopher Jones
Christopher is currently Deputy Head of a secondary school in North London. Previously he was part of the Senior Leadership Team of a large 11-18 academy in Kent. Christopher has worked on a number of teacher training programme including the Troops to Teachers initiative. As a governor, Christopher is keen to understand education through another lens and share his experience of strategic development and academic management. Having grown up in Wales and Norway Christopher is passionate about how education can prepare students for their role as global citizens. Outside of education, Christopher is a successfully, largely self taught artist who has held a number of exhibitions in London.
Fatos Kocakaya-Rane
Fatos comes from a Turkish background where she is fully eqipped with both language and cultural diversity. She has a degree in BA Economics where she started her financial career where she had grown in gaining experience and knowledge. Feeling very proud to be part of the AJK as a parent, now would be a great opportunity to join the team as a Governor to bring in new ideas and to support body of governors to build a bridge with parents, especially with those with whom lack the communication due to the language barrier.