Welcome to CTAD website!

Jim Pateman

Jim Pateman, Senior Development Director, leads the team. Jim has worked on policy development and implementation in basic skills at national and local level with many government departments and agencies involved in education and training. He has an unrivalled understanding of the issues involved in Skills for Life (adult literacy, numeracy and ESOL).

Sarah Blackmore

Sarah joined in 2004 as Director of Consultancy and Development. She is a published writer and pedagogical expert with extensive experience in theory and practice. She specialised in working with underachieving learners and those with learning disabilities. At Tribal CTAD she has set up a family learning capability through Step in to Learning and is heaviliy involved in many teacher training activities involving blended learning.

Barry Brooks

Barry Brooks joined as Director of Lifelong Learning in 2005. Formerly a member of the Senior Civil Service at the DfES, he planned and delivered Skills for Life, the national strategy for literacy, language and numeracy skills in young people and adults. He also led policy on key aspects of two White Papers: 14-19 Learning and Skills and Skills: getting on at work, getting on in business. The DfES retains him as Chair of the Functional Skills Project Board, to help develop the revised GCSEs in English, Maths, ICT and Specialist Diplomas. He also has extensive international experience.

Denis Hall

Originally project director for the Skills for Life Pathfinder at the LSAC in Tyne and Wear, Denis has been a senior consultant at Tribal CTAD since 2002. Since joining Tribal CTAD he has managed many projects for LSCs, including Key Skills capacity audits for a number of LSCs; he was part of the team from the Centre for Economic and Social Inclusion (CESI) in London that created regional assessments of skills and needs requirements in South East and South West Wales for ELWa. He has also written the Basic Skills Strategies for Central London, Cambridge, County Durham and Greater Manchester, has helped to develop a basic skills strategy for Birmingham and Solihull Connexions service.

Karen Davies

Karen is a major figure in the Skills for Life community, with immense experience in managing major programmes for adult learners of all kinds, including those with disabilities or difficulties, and in many different environments. For 10 years she was a partner in her own company (now part of Tribal CTAD) and carried out many commissions for agencies such as QCA, the Basic Skills Agency, the Home Office and the Learning and Skills Development Agency. Her current focus is on work with offenders and socially excluded groups, and the development of learning resources for teachers and prison and probation staff on dyslexia and speaking and listening. She has extensive experience with multimedia products and workplace basic skills.

Janet Byatt

As a director of Be Consultancy since 1993 and of Tribal CTAD since 2003, Janet has been involved in many national projects, including research and development for the Basic Skills Agency and City & Guilds, developing products including screening and assessment tools, print based and multimedia key skills and, most recently, managing the content for the DfES Embedded Learning Materials project for CfBT. This took three years and has now delivered a vast selection of print and multimedia resources for many different occupations.