Four directors resign from researchED in quick succession

Four directors have resigned in quick succession from researchED, the conference company set up by the government’s behaviour adviser Tom Bennett, information filed at Companies House has revealed.

Sam Freedman, Daisy Christodoulou, Dylan Wiliam and Becky Allen all stood down from the company, which runs conferences promoting teacher engagement with research and which is ultimately controlled by Mr Bennett, during December and January.

This would appear to leave only two directors remaining at the organisation, which was set up nearly 10 years ago, initially as a “trading name” for Mr Bennett’s company Anvil Education, but then as a separate company limited by guarantee.

Mr Bennett seems not to respond to requests for comment from this website, and most of the other directors have also not responded when asked about researchED’s recent set-up by me. So reasons for the resignations are not clear.

However, Mr Freedman, a former adviser to Michael Gove as Education Secretary who publicly discussed the formation of a “grassroots” conference organisation for teachers in 2013, told me in October that he had “stopped being involved” in researchED in 2021 after the organisation had “decided it didn’t want to be” a charity.