Tom Shinner

This article is part of the Spinwatch privatisation of Schools Portal project.

Tom Shinner became Director of Cross-Government Policy Coordination at the Department for Exiting the European Union (DexEU) in July 2016. According to his gov.uk profile: 'His directorate leads DExEU’s work to coordinate the domestic policy implications of exit, across government departments, to seize the opportunities and ensure a smooth process of exit.'

He was previously UK Department for Education director of strategy from the end of 2013. He was 28 when he was appointed. He was also a board member of the UK Department for Education.

Prior to becoming an adviser to then Education secretary Michael Gove, Shinner was a managament consultant with McKinsey & Company.

He was also co-founder of a free school in South London, the Greenwich Free School.

Gove adviser

As Director of Strategy, Shinner's job was to advise Education Secretaries Michael Gove and later Nicky Morgan. He also led the Department for Education's strategy unit, performance unit, implementation group and policy advisers; as well as supporting the 'effective implementation of high-priority initiatives'.

Meetings with external organisations

Shinner met with the following organisations between September 2014 and July 2015:

• Policy Exchange and Uncommon Schools (Sept 2014). Uncommon schools (www.uncommonschools.org), is a US charter school operator co-founded by John King Jr, US Education Secretary from 2016. Uncommon Schools managing director, Doug Lemov gave the inaugural Policy Exchange / Teach First Education Lecture in September 2014.
• Teach First and Policy Exchange (October 2014)
• Teach First (October and December 2014, May 2015)
• Teacher Development Trust
• Centre for Social Justice
• Sutton Trust
• Education Endownment Foundation
• The Brilliant Club (September and December 2014)
• British Council
• Office of the Presidency, Ghana
• Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (January and February 2015)
• CfBT Education Trust
• Parthenon, management consultancy, with a focus on education markets, that merged with Ernst & Young (EY) in September 2014
• Cambridge Assessment
• Ark
• Ormiston Academies Trust
• Floreat Education
• New Schools Network
• Baker Dearing Trust, organisation founded by Kenneth Baker (Lord Baker, Margaret Thatcher's former education secretary) and Lord Ronald Dearing to develop and promote the concept of university technical colleges.
• Education and Employers Taskforce
• NAHT, formerly known as the National Association of Head Teachers, the 'union for school leaders'.
• ASCL, Association of School and College Leaders
• Independent Schools Council
• Institute for Government
• NCS Trust, organisation running the National Citizen Service
• Ofqual
• Ofsted
• BESLink
• Fluent Interaction
• Sheree Dodd