Edinburgh College strengthens management team

Edinburgh College has appointed new senior staff members to its top-level management team, to drive a three-year plan to transform the college.

A new depute principal and three new assistant principals have joined the college’s restructured Executive team, which provides leadership to the organisation.

The new appointments, including the initial portfolios for the assistant principals, are:

• Depute Principal – Alex Craig
• Assistant Principal Curriculum Design and Development – Jon Buglass
• Assistant Principal Income and Product Development – Mike Jeffrey
• Assistant Principal Recruitment and Retention – Jonny Pearson

Alex joins from City of Glasgow College, where he has been depute principal since 2012, vice principal from 2011 and, before that, assistant principal at Newcastle College. He is already familiar with Edinburgh College, having been a lecturer, head of school and assistant principal at Edinburgh’s Telford College, one of the organisation’s legacy colleges, from 1992 to 2009.

Jon and Jonny are currently associate principals at Edinburgh College and were previously heads of the college’s centres for Creative Industries and Health, Wellbeing and Social Sciences, respectively. Mike is head of the college’s centre for Engineering.

The Executive team is now five strong and headed by Principal Annette Bruton. It will lead the college during a crucial period as it undertakes a three-year programme of transformation that will fundamentally reshape its curriculum and financial model. The Transformation Plan will ensure the curriculum provides the right training in key growth areas where there is a demand for skills from industry. It will also build on existing good practice to ensure students have the best education experience possible and are equipped for the world of work or further studies.

Principal Annette Bruton said: “This is an important milestone in our development and the delivery of our Transformation Plan. The calibre of the new team members means we’re in a really strong position now to make the necessary changes to our curriculum and financial model to ensure we’re successful, sustainable and able to meet the needs of students, businesses and our economy.”

The college carried out an extensive recruitment process for all posts and considered a wide field of high-quality applicants.

Annette said: “The standard of applicants was excellent and the successful appointees faced very tough competition for the posts.

“The newly formed Executive has vast experience of further education, including backgrounds in teaching and leadership, so they understand the sector and the opportunities for our college to make huge differences to people’s lives. I’m proud to have them with us to lead our college and looking forward to working closely together to give more people more opportunities to succeed.”

Edinburgh College’s Chair of the Board of Management, Ian McKay, said: “These are vital roles so it was important we got the appointments right, and I couldn’t be happier with the outcome. These are the best people to achieve the college’s strategic aims, deliver on our Regional Outcome Agreement and drive our work on important national programmes such as Developing the Young Workforce.

“Further education has been through many challenges over the last few years but, with our transformational work underway, we’re moving into a new and very positive stage now and have the right mix at our top level.

“On behalf of the Board, I want to congratulate the new team and wish them all the best for their roles, which they’re beginning at a very exciting time for our college and our sector.”

Alex Craig said: “I’m delighted to be returning to Edinburgh as the new depute principal at Edinburgh College, and I’m excited to be working with the principal and all stakeholders to drive the college forward through the next stages of its journey. It’s a huge honour to have this opportunity at what is a really important time for the college, and to be supporting the development of further education in the region. I’m looking forward to meeting staff and teams soon and to working alongside some very talented people.”

The assistant principals take up their roles this month, while the new depute principal will start in October.