Who is “Mike at Brentwood”?

New twist in Waltham Holy Cross saga

Mystery continues to surround the identity of the elusive “Mike from Brentwood”, referred to in an email written by the Regional Schools Commissioner, Sue Baldwin, but sent in error to a parent.

 

Mystery continues to surround the identity of the elusive “Mike from Brentwood”, referred to in an email written by the Regional Schools Commissioner, Sue Baldwin, but sent in error to a parent.

The development is a comic twist in the otherwise very concerning tale of Waltham Holy Cross Primary School in Essex, which Education Uncovered reports extensively about, again, today.

As we reported last month, in a development later mentioned in Private Eye, the email sent by accident to a parent included a communication sent to the office of the National Schools Commissioner and two other people.

It had come after the parent requested the minutes of April’s Headteacher Board, which had seemingly decided the fate of the school, but which at the time were still not available.

The email said: “Can we please…issue a short acknowledgement tomorrow to say it is being treated as an FOI and provide the dates by which it will be responded to.

“The line on the HTB minutes is straightforward – we provided an unpublished draft note of the meeting to Mike at Brentwood. If the minutes aren’t published, then as soon as we can, get them out in draft and close down this line of enquiry.”

The parent has recently been in discussions with DfE officials about who “Mike at Brentwood” is.

We understand she was told initially, in a telephone conversation, that he was Mike Capon, an education consultant who sits on the Interim Executive Board (IEB) which is currently in charge of Waltham Holy Cross.

However, 20 minutes later the official phoned back to be told “no it’s not Mike on the IEB but an [unnamed] headteacher from Brentwood.”

An email sent to the parent this week as a follow-up states: “As discussed, the reference to Mike in Sue [Baldwin’s] email of 20 June is not referring to Mike Capon.”

So the mystery continues.