The President for the next year is Fiona Sheriff. She is another female teacher, continuing a welcome trend for the last few years. She is also the youngest ever GA President, having been born in the year when I started teaching.
I sent Fiona the questions that I had given to all other Presidents and used them to create the post below. I'm grateful to Fiona for the level of detail she provided.
When and where were you born?
"I was born in 1988 in Chelmsford, Essex. I grew up in Braintree in north Essex. My dad is Braintree born and bred, but my mum is a Londoner with Irish heritage."
Image credit: Alistair Hamill
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| Baby photo - Fiona Sheriff |
"Growing up, my parents didn’t drive so we went to the most local schools to us. At Primary level, I went to John Bunyan Infant and Junior School which I started at in 1992, followed by Tabor High School (now Tabor Academy) which I started at in 1999.
My memories of Primary school geography are of place-based studies such as completing an enquiry about St. Lucia (a place I have wanted to go to ever since!) and many studies of Braintree as a market town. Our fieldwork always seemed to centre around a walk up and down Bradford Street which has a fascinating history!
At secondary school we started by doing a carousel of humanities subject with Mr Pritchard and Mr Mullender, both of whom terrified me! Mr Pritchard had also taught my dad in the 1970s in the same school. In Year 9 I then had Miss Fox – who still teaches Geography in Essex now and with whom I re-connected with at the GA conference in Oxford. Sadly, at aged 14 I had other aspirations: becoming an interior designer and therefore geography was not one of my GCSE options.
This is a little rare for GA Presidents, but regular followers of the blog will know that a lot of GA Presidents in the early days had no formal geographical connection.
Instead, I studied Double Art, French and Drama. I did well in my GCSEs achieving 1 A*, 8 Bs and a C, and through my own admission did no revision, despite being targeted lower grades due to the area I lived in. I had some challenging times at school, but enjoyed it nonetheless.
Following my time at Tabor High School, I then studied A Levels at Braintree College from 2004-2007. At this time, the College was undergoing significant change and was about to stop offering A Levels, so the standard of teaching we received was very mixed. A few personal things also happened during my A Level studies, so my attendance became patchy in my first year.
I studied A Level Geography, Law and AS History and General Studies.
My Geography teacher Anna Bass was incredible. She’d spent some time in the US and had this fantastic Anglo-US accent. She would say things like “That’s neat, huh!” and she really enjoyed what she did. I probably still need to apologise a thousand times over for throwing up on our field trip to Wales!
She really encouraged my love and fascination for Geography, but I definitely didn’t realise the importance of this then.
During my A Levels I completed my UCAS application to study Paramedic Science but was declined as I didn’t have a driving licence! Instead, I turned my sights to joining the RAF as an Intelligence Officer as I had been heavily involved in the Air Training Corps since I was 15.
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| Graduation photo - Fiona Sheriff |
In 2007, a chance watching of an Open University TV ad encouraged me to take a look at what they had to offer so I embarked on my degree just after my 19th birthday and studied a range of courses with them until 2013 when I achieved my Open degree. I undertook courses which were geography based and this included modules about the environmental policy making, international development, and journeys through a changing world. At the time the OU weren’t offering a Geography degree, so I had opted to do the BSc Open instead. I achieved a 2:2 in my degree, but had also worked full time throughout it so I am very proud of my result. I was also the first person in my close family to gain a university degree, so whilst I may not have taken a traditional route it has shaped my approach to education and made me more determined to succeed."
What has your career pathway been?
I never set out to be a teacher and had wanted to join the RAF, however my first job role was as a waitress in a Wimpy burger restaurant during my A Levels. That job taught me a lot about patience, attention to detail and how to wash dishes!
In 2008 I had moved up to Norfolk to be closer to where I was training young people to fly in the Air Training Corps.
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| Fiona in uniform - Fiona Sheriff |
I was passionate about getting more girls into flying and to ‘give back’ for the opportunities that I had been afforded as an Air Cadet. During this time I also worked for Norwich Union – now Aviva, updating customer details and sending letters.
In 2010 I moved back to Essex and became a learning support assistant at Tabor High School, which was very strange as a lot of my old teachers were still there and now I could call them by their first names.
I then became a cover supervisor and taught a lot of art, food technology and photography and spent a lot of time teaching students how to use the dark room which had previously been used as a store cupboard.
I then moved to Honywood Community Science College in 2012 as a cover supervisor before starting my teacher training there with Essex Teacher Training in 2013. At ETT we gained QTS and had the option of completing some extra modules to gain a PGCE through Edge Hill University, which I did – and attended the graduation there despite never going there!
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| Edge Hill Graduation - Fiona Sheriff |
I enjoyed my time at Notley, and only left due to me re-locating to Northampton to move in with my now husband.
The first school I taught at in Northampton was The Duston School in 2015, where I quickly picked up a promotion to Head of Year 10 in my NQT+1 year. That role taught me huge amounts about pastoral care, safeguarding, working with alternative provisions and the transition to GCSE.
Following this I moved to Kingsthorpe College in 2016 where I started as Director of Learning, this was a Head of House role and I was in charge of Purple House where I remained in this role until 2018 when I had my first child Isabella.
On my return to work in 2019 I became Lead Practitioner for Vocational Subjects and Community Engagement where I predominantly taught Travel and Tourism.
In this role I also ran a range of community projects which included setting up a PTFA – sadly due to the global pandemic and lockdown, many of my plans ground to a halt and when we returned to school in September 2020 my role had changed considerably and I then became Head of Geography instead – the role which I have held ever since.
At both Duston and Kingsthorpe I was also the DofE manager until 2023.
During my time as Head of Geography I have also had two further maternity leaves.
Outside of teaching, I continued to be a gliding instructor until 2017. I transferred to 616 VGS at RAF Henlow in 2013 following the closure of RAF Watton, and flew the GROB Vigilant which was a motor glider and then had a brief spell at 637 VGS at Little Rissington, before deciding that the good old days of Air Cadet gliding were no more.
Since 2020 I have engaged in a variety of different geography projects including presenting for the RGS, writing the ‘100 ideas for Secondary Geography Fieldwork’ published by Bloomsbury in 2024 (and which also won a GA Silver Publishing Award in 2025) and leading the UK Polar Network Antarctic Flags project since 2020 where hundreds of schools around the world have had students send artwork down to Antarctica to be photographed.
I have also worked on a range of projects for Tutor2U including presenting at student revision workshops, creating fieldwork packs and writing a range of resources. I’ve enjoyed writing articles for a variety of publications and blogs included WideWorld, the GA blog and HWRK magazine. "
What was your job when you became President?
"I am currently Head of Geography at Kingsthorpe College in Northampton and I work three days a week there."
What theme did you choose when President, and why did you pick it? What had been your involvement with the GA leading up to that time?
"My theme for my Presidential year is ‘Passionate About Geography’, which I think leads on nicely from Catherine Owen’s theme of ‘Geography Makes A Difference’.
One of the first things people ask you when you are elected is “what will your theme be?” and I floated between a few ideas but found it really tough to make a decision, until Briley Habib sent me a message one day saying “I think you’ve found your conference theme – Passion!” and that lit the lightbulb for me. My students always say that I am so passionate about what I do and how I want to help them, so this felt like a really good fit. Being passionate about geography feels like a celebration of our subject and gives us the opportunity to share why we really love what we do. It also encourages us to share that with our students. Passion is at the heart of geography. It drives us to explore, question and understand the world around us. Geography helps us make sense of our planet and our place within it, but more than that, it encourages us to care. Passion transforms geographical knowledge into something meaningful, prompting us to make connections and engage with real-world issues.
For many students, that passion begins in the classroom. Through powerful enquiries and meaningful experiences, we can spark curiosity and help shape how young people think about the world. In a time of complex global challenges, from climate change to inequality, geography provides essential understanding, but it is passion that motivates action.
My involvement with the GA started quite late. I have always been a school member, but I didn’t attend my first GA conference until 2021 when it was online and then in 2022 I attended the conference at Guildford where I presented on local fieldwork ideas.
At the time there were only around 6 people in the room, but one of those was Elaine Anderson who I then worked with closely on the Oak National Academy collaboration with the GA as the curriculum development lead, so that felt like right time, right place.
I had my second baby, Luna, a few weeks before conference in 2023 so did not attend that year but have since presented in 2024, 2025 and 2026. In 2023 I led my geography department to the Secondary Geography Quality Mark and Centre of Excellence which was a great opportunity to really audit what we do and consider our strengths and areas for development.
In 2024 I was awarded the GA Excellence Award and the OS Award by the RGS.
I have also authored an article for Teaching Geography on our ‘Golden Threads’ curriculum and an article for the GA magazine on playability and fieldwork.
In my role as a consultant for the GA I have also undertaken some work with the BBC, auditing their resources on BBC Teach and Bitesize and making re-writing the suite of teachers notes for secondary geography.
Why does the GA matter to you? How did you get involved, and what roles have you played within the GA?
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| Fiona in Svalbard |
The group are a fantastic support, and it is full of really talented, caring and dedicated professionals.
At the 2024 conference, the then GA President, Denise Freeman came and spoke to me one lunchtime about how I should consider running for GA President and that it had been commented on by a few people.
One message from her conference was to be ‘Positively Delusional’ and gaining a nomination to run for GA President certainly felt like it fit that message. If elected, I was about to become the youngest ever GA President and possibly had the shortest membership time in comparison to those who came before me. In the election, both myself and Kit-Marie Rackley were in contention for the role. Kit is a phenomenal educator and all round good-egg and even to be standing next to Kit in an election felt like a huge honour, so to be elected blew my mind.
As part of the presidential role I will also be a trustee for three years. This is a really interesting part of the role and I have learnt a lot about the inner workings of the GA and how charities operate.
In my role as President, I hope to really celebrate geography and encourage more young people to get involved, study the subject and become advocates for it themselves.
Best wishes to Fiona for her year as GA President.
