Members of The Priory Academy LSST's LGB come from a wide variety of different backgrounds. Below you will find a short biography of each of our thirteen Governors. Please click on the following link for details of appointments and attendance:

Governing Body Membership 2025-26 and Attendance 2024-25

Ms V Townshend (Chair)

Vic Townshend is a senior NHS leader and Portfolio Director with NHS England’s Get It Right First Time (GIRFT) programme. She leads national work on Population Health Management and reducing health inequalities, helping NHS trusts and health & care systems use data and evidence to improve outcomes for people and communities. With more than 16 years’ experience across NHS provider and system roles, Vic has led major transformation programmes and developed strong partnerships across health, local government, and community sectors. Her background spans strategy, service improvement, and governance, with a focus on turning evidence into practical action and delivering measurable results.

Before joining NHS England, Vic led the design and implementation of the Lincolnshire Population Health Management Blueprint, supporting integrated planning and data-driven decision-making across the county’s health and care system. Earlier in her career, she held senior operational roles in hospital services, gaining hands-on experience in leading teams and improving performance.

Vic became Chair of Governors at The Priory Academy LSST in 2022, having served on the governing body for several years. She is committed to high standards, strong governance, and helping every student achieve their potential. All four of Vic’s children attended LSST, with her youngest son finishing in summer 2024, giving her a long-standing and personal connection to the school community.

Mr J Rouston (Vice Chair) 

Jon is a Speech and Language Therapist by background and a senior clinical leader the NHS. He has been practising in the NHS for more than 20 years across specialist and mainstream education and with adults with learning disabilities and mental health needs. Jon returned to Lincoln after ten years working in Nottingham to lead a regional team providing communication aids to adults and children across the East Midlands region.

More recently Jon has moved to a strategic leadership role in an NHS Trust in South Yorkshire – developing and delivering transformation projects across the trust and system and providing professional leadership for Allied Health Professionals in the trust.

Originating from Lincoln and a former pupil of the school, Jon currently has close links through his two sons who attend the school

Dr Chloe Gilgan 

Dr Chloë Gilgan is a Senior Lecturer in law and Deputy Director of Research at the University of Lincoln Law School where she leads modules on constitutional law and public international law, supervises dissertations, provides pastoral support for students, and was the former Chair of the School's Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) Committee.  She was awarded and completed her ESRC White Rose Post-doctoral Fellowship and ESRC-funded PhD at the University of York. She also holds a Juris Doctorate (JD) from New York Law School and a BA in Urban Studies/Film from Barnard College, Columbia University. She was awarded the Professor Lung-Chu Chen Award for Excellence in the Field of Human Rights for her public service to the Brooklyn District Attorney’s office, the Crown Prosecution Service (London), the Women’s Rights Project at the national office of the ACLU in New York, the New York State Division of Human Rights and the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia. She was admitted to the New York State Bar in 2009 and then worked at a London law firm handling US and UK immigration before embarking on an academic career. She has presented her research at over 20 national and international conferences, and her research has been widely published in leading academic journals and as evidence for the UK Foreign Affairs Select Committee. Her recent book on Lessons from Syria will be published by Routledge. She is committed to using her expertise, skills, and networks to support the development of the school for all staff and students. Chloë's two children attend Priory LSST. 

Mrs Sophie Clayton 

Sophie has over 20 years of strategic and operational experience working in Human Resources in the public, private and the third sector.  With an interest in understanding people and behaviour, Sophie studied Psychology as her undergraduate degree, focussing on Child Development, before embarking on her HR career.  She completed her MSc in Human Resources Management in 2006 and is a Chartered member of the CIPD. 

Sophie’s current role, as Human Resources Business Partner within an NHS Trust working with mental health, learning disabilities and autism, enables her to support people and communities through working as a trusted partner to the leadership team, advising on sensitive and confidential matters, including safeguarding, and taking a lead role in organisational and culture change initiatives.

Sophie has two children who attend the school and is keen to support young people and the wider school community.

Dr Emma Forrest-Leigh, PhD, MA, SFHEA, FRSA, FSET, PGCE, QTLS, RTS, MIEE, MCE, MOS, CMI, NGA, FIEP

Dr Emma Forrest-Leigh is an experienced and award-winning education leader with more than 25 years in senior and executive roles across Further, Higher, and Adult Education. She has served as Vice Principal, Executive Director, and Campus Principal within some of the UK’s largest college groups, leading teams of over 1,000 staff and 20,000 students to deliver national-benchmark excellence and Outstanding Ofsted outcomes.

Named among the UK’s Top 50 Professionals (2024) and recipient of the Queen’s Award for Digital Innovation, Emma is nationally recognised for pioneering digital transformation and curriculum reform. She authored one of the UK’s first Creative T Levels for the Department for Education and co-created the country’s first Metaverse Campus with Google, reflecting her commitment to future-focused, inclusive learning.

A published PhD researcher and Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, Emma’s academic work explores the ethical interface between artificial intelligence and humanity. She is a Lead Assessor for the Association of Colleges Beacon Awards and an active member of several national boards, including fellowship with the Royal Society of the Arts, HEA and Institute of Employability Professionals.

Emma is passionate about inclusion, creativity, and opportunity. Her leadership has expanded access to education for disadvantaged learners and forged strong partnerships between schools, colleges, and employers. Emma has enabled a large volume of fully funded International travel for students from disadvantages backgrounds, alongside her personal work as a jeweler, having made jewellery for Topshop, Argos, Toyah Willcox and exhibited at the Victoria & Albert museum in London. As a governor with two children placed within the Priory Trust, she brings a strategic, compassionate, and forward-looking perspective, focused on excellence, innovation, and ensuring every learner thrives.