My name’s Sue Sturgeon, and I’m the Chair of Activate Learning. Well, I retired from my substantive position in 2017. I was the chief executive officer of Guildford Borough Council, which is a £150 million business with about 800 staff. I joined Guildford College about six years ago and when we merged with Activate Learning in 2018, I became the link governor from Guildford, who joined the board.

They asked me to join as I was somebody who had been to Guilford College in the late seventies and I was somebody who struggled at school; I did not like school, it didn’t work for me. Yet when I joined Guildford College to do A Levels there, I really thrived. What made the difference was that there was somebody that believed in me and inspired me, and it really made me want to work and to learn. I went on to do Accountancy in my career.

I became the Chair of Activate Learning about 18 months ago and we’ve gone through a period of managing two of the mergers that took place just before I joined. I think we’ve made a lot of positive progress, but there’s lots more work to be done. I think I’ve really been able to add value in that work. We’ve also, throughout 2021, been going through a process of appointing a new CEO as our former CEO, Sally, retired in 2022.