Surinder has been involved in teaching and learning of mathematics for the over 25 years. He studied Mathematics & Physics (BSc), Control Engineering and ICT (MSc) and completed his PGCE at Kings College London (under the mentoring of Dylan Wiliam). His first teaching post was at the high achieving Seven Kings High School under the leadership of Sir Alan Steer, followed by two promotions at St. Edwards CofE School (Second and then Head of Department), where he led the department to consistently and significantly raise its A*-C results to 86%.
Before moving into Senior Leadership, Surinder worked for four years as a LA Secondary Mathematics Consultant for Barking and Dagenham; during this time, his understanding of whole school and subject development was influenced by regular training through national and local initiatives. This provided Surinder with opportunities to work with teachers (in and outside the classroom), subject teams, subject leaders and senior leadership. The need to tailor the approach for each school was an essential learning curve, whilst maintaining the desired outcomes. During this time the average mathematics A*-C pass rate increased by 10% across the local authority.
As an Assistant Headteacher (in charge of Student Progress) at The King Edmund School, Surinder honed his understanding that accurately tracking students’ current progress and developing an ownership of next steps in students learning is essential to developing a sense of life-long learning. He believes, in order to support this, teachers must have a thorough understanding of not only the progression within a topic but have an understanding of the links between topics. Surinder had the opportunity to become a Trainee Ofsted Inspector (with Serco), which enabled him to support the work of the Senior and Middle Leadership teams to move the school from ‘Requires Improvement’ to ‘Good’.
Surinder is able to offer a variety of support, from individual teachers to subject teams – he has provided curriculum, pedagogy, monitoring and professional development support for a range of secondary providers. In recent years, he has provided bespoke support to schools in the Havering Learning Partnership and Barking & Dagenham School Improvement Partnership, working with teams on identifying and developing their priorities. He has led Borough wide training events (which have allowed for sharing of excellent practice) and coordinated support across schools, fostering a collaborative approach to raising standards in Mathematics. He was recognised for this work by the London NE MathsHub, winning the Head of Department/Coordinator award for 2018. He now works with the London NE MathsHub in a leadership capacity as the Assistant Secondary MathsHub Lead.