The background
I started out as a teacher. Like most people who end up in education, I genuinely believed in what I was doing. Teaching is hard work, often thankless, and occasionally brilliant. It is where I learned that children are far more capable than the system often gives them credit for — and that the gap between a child's potential and their outcomes usually says more about the system than it does about the child.
I moved into school leadership, then headship. That is where the complexity really begins. You are no longer just responsible for learning in your own classroom. You are responsible for the learning of every child in the building, and for the professional growth of every adult who works there. It changes how you think.
SEN was where I saw the sharpest inequalities. Children with Education, Health and Care Plans waiting months — sometimes years — for appropriate provision. Families fighting the same battles year after year. Schools doing their best with resources that were never adequate. I became determined to understand the system well enough to change it.
Becoming a Schools Inspector gave me the missing piece. I spent years seeing schools from the outside — understanding how the regulatory framework works, what good looks like in practice, and where the distance between policy intent and classroom reality is widest. SEN was almost always part of that gap.
I left inspection to found Independent Schools Futures with my business partner. ISF exists to open new specialist SEN schools — provision that genuinely works for children who have been failed by the mainstream. Martyn Ward Consulting sits alongside that: working with existing schools, local authorities, and families who need expert support to navigate the system as it is today.
How I work
I am direct. I will tell you what I actually think, not what I think you want to hear. If I cannot help you, I will tell you that too, and I will try to point you towards someone who can.
I work with a small number of clients at any one time. That is a deliberate choice. The work is too important to spread thin.
Most engagements start with a free 30-minute call. No agenda other than understanding your situation and whether there is something useful I can do.
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