Neil Bichard has been a governor since September 1992 and was originally an LEA governor appointed by Dorset County Council.

Neil is a qualified architect practicing in Broadstone, with a degree from Portsmouth School of Architecture and a post graduate diploma from Birmingham School of Architecture. Prior to that he was educated at a local boys grammar school and has been married since September 1990 and has a daughter and a son. It’s best not mentioned that he was chair of the old boys association of his former school for 6 years.

Neil also served as a governor at Springdale First School for 9 years, 8 of which were as Chair of Governors, and is a local scout leader . In his spare time Neil is a volunteer warden on Brownsea Island, a board member of East Dorset Heritage Trust and sings in the choir of St. Peter’s Church in Bournemouth together with Dorset Chamber Choir.. Many of you may also have seen him as head marshall and co-organiser of the Broadstone Christmas Parade.

Neil has always been a strong supporter of the school in his time as a governor and has been a “staff” member on the school ski trip for 7 years and was also a DofE supervisor and assessor having helped run the Bronze award at the school for more than 10 years. He has also supported, and taken part in, the History Department’s Battlefield Tour, speaking on the architectural aspects, and in particular the work of Sir Edwin Lutyens at Thiepval. In addition he has helped on the Y7 Viking experience at Cranborne ATC as well as attending music, drama and sports events at the school.

As well as being on the Full Governing Body, Neil chairs both the Governors’ Premises Committee and the Health and Safety Committee, and is link Governor with both the History and Music Departments. Neil is also chair of Poole Grammar School Enterprises Limited, the school’s trading subsidiary.

I have been a Parent Governor since November 2014. I have a degree in Physics from Trinity Hall, Cambridge, an MBA from London Business School and a Master’s degree in Mathematics from the Open University.

I worked for a number of years for an American Investment bank in London, running the derivatives trading business.

I have two boys at Poole Grammar school and two girls at Parkstone Grammar school, where I am also a Governor. I sit on the Governor’s Education Committee. My interests are technology and computing, and I am about to study for a Master’s degree in Data Science at Bournemouth University.

My teaching career was 43 years in 5 different schools.

I taught at Poole Grammar School for 18 years, being appointed as Head of Religion and Philosophy. I went on to become an Assistant Head Teacher where I was responsible for staff development, the timetable and line-managing several departments.

I was a staff governor for 8 years.

I also led on international links, during this time we forged very strong relationships with several schools in Sweden, Spain, Germany, Hungary and The Netherlands.

I attended St. Luke’s College in Exeter (Exeter University School of Education) and I have a master’s degree in religion and philosophy from Bath Spa University.

I have been a Farmington Fellow at Harris Manchester College, Oxford since 1998 and am hoping to study for a DPhil at Oxford from the Autumn 2023.

I am a steward at Winchester Cathedral.

Adrian Falck is an Academy Governor and an old boy of the School.

Adrian was first appointed a Governor in 2006 and is currently a member of the Finance, Staffing and Audit Committees, Chairman of the Admissions Committee and a member of the Discipline panel. He is also the link governor for the Geography department.

Adrian is a Partner of Preston Redman Solicitors in Bournemouth practicing in commercial and residential property and property litigation. Outside of the office, Adrian is a qualified Mountain Leader and is a Trainer and Assessor for the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award.

Susan has been at Poole Grammar School for 16 years and is currently a Support Staff Governor. Susan currently manages the School website, social media feeds and e-comms among other functions! Susan is also a keen photographer and takes the majority of photos for school publications. As a Support Staff Governor, Susan attends meetings of the Full Governing Body, and is also a member of the Premises committee.

Simon Fuller joined the Governing Body in 2020 as a parent Governor.  He serves on both the Finance and Full Governor committees.  He has two sons at the school, one in Year 11 and the other in Year 8.  He is also an ex-student himself from the eighties.

 Simon is currently Director of Business and Finance at Highcliffe School so helps bring additional educational experience to the Governors.  Prior to that role, Simon worked in the Private Sector for companies such as Ernst & Young, Barclays and Liverpool Victoria.

David is an old boy of PGS (1971-78) and has been a governor on the Education Committee since 2002. He is a Computer Scientist, with degrees from Manchester University in Physics & Electronics Engineering, and Software Engineering from Bournemouth University, where he is a Senior Lecturer in Systems Integration in the Faculty of Science and Technology. David has published numerous academic papers on Computer Networks in many international journals and has presented invited keynote speeches at conferences throughout Europe and Internationally including India, Korea and South America. He visits colleagues in the USA and has worked with companies such as Ferranti, Plessey Semiconductor, Schlumberger Instruments, Fairchild & National Semiconductor, Cisco and IBM. As Chairman of Poole Borough’s Education Committee, he negotiated grants and funding of over £100m from Whitehall to improve Poole’s Primary and Secondary Schools. He currently chairs the BOP Environment and the Audit Committees.

I became a Parent Governor in 2022 and sit on both the Full Board of Governors and the Finance Committee.  I have a son at the school in Year 8 and also a daughter at Parkstone Grammar School. 

I have a BSC (Hons) degree in Financial Services from the University of Manchester and a professional banking qualification, gained during a 34-year career with Barclays, RBS, Santander and Handelsbanken.

In my banking career I undertook a variety of roles, and some of the skills I developed are particularly useful to me as a Governor.  These include strategic planning, financial analysis and risk assessment.  I also gained significant experience in people management including leadership, coaching and mentoring. 

I am a passionate believer that co-curricular activities are key to the health and well-being of students and are an important complement to their academic success.

In my spare time I play tennis, occasionally run Poole Parkrun and enjoy watching football. 

Amanda Smith joined Poole Grammar School as its Headteacher in September 2020.

Amanda studied Neuroscience at the University of Cardiff, graduating in 1994. Once she had completed her degree, she went on to study for a PhD in Neurophysiology at the University of Leicester.  She studied for her PGCE in 1999 and once complete, began work in Leicester and then Sheffield as a Science teacher. More recently she worked at South Wilts Grammar School in Salisbury before beginning her headship at Poole Grammar School in 2020.

As the Principal Governor, Amanda attends all Full Governing Body and committee meetings.

My husband and I run a shopfitting business for which I studied accountancy to Technician level to enable me to further understand our company accounts. I am Finance Director and control the accounts and payroll and implement all financial decisions as required to run our business.

I was first a governor in 1993 at our children’s First School in Verwood, serving two terms as a parent governor, a role which I thoroughly enjoyed and found the experience of being involved in the development of the school very enjoyable. When I finished my second term I was vice chair of governors and Chair of the Finance Committee, our youngest being at middle school by this time.

This led me two years later to being elected as parent governor at Poole Grammar School, where I have been pleased to be able to reprise my governor role, albeit on a completely different level. The differences in the size of the budget and the age and number of pupils are vast but I have found it surprising how many similarities there are and how much of my past experience has been invaluable. I am now in my third term of office and am an Academy governor serving on the Admissions, Staffing and Finance committees and have recently been elected as Chair of Finance.

I am the link governor for Physics where my interest is mainly through our son who gained a good engineering degree and is now working as a Research Engineer.

I was elected as a parent Governor in 2016; I have a son in year 9 and I currently work at Canford Heath Junior School. I worked in retail management but stayed at home once we had children. Since then I have taken numerous educational courses and am currently working towards a qualification as a level 3 teaching assistant.

As a parent I have been involved in various committees, I was the chair of the PTA at my children’s infant school, this included organising and running various fund raising events and I currently represent the Grammar School as a member of Poole Parents Voice.

I attend the Full Governor Committee meetings and am on the Premises Committee. I am also a link Governor for the Learning Resource Centre.