The Directors of Plymouth CAST are delighted to announce the appointment of Zoe Batten to the post of Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Trust, following an open recruitment process. Zoe will join the Trust from September 2020, when she will take over from Raymond Friel, who has been CEO of the Trust since July 2018. Raymond has overseen the improvement of the Trust educationally and financially and he has led on developing the vision and values, with a strong focus on the Catholic life of our schools. The Trust is immensely grateful to Raymond for the excellent job he has done in taking the Trust forward and preparing it for its next chapter, and we wish him well with his new ventures.
Zoe Batten will join us from Alumnis Multi Academy Trust in North Devon where she is currently CEO having taken the Trust from inception to its current position as a 7 school Trust. Zoe has a strong background in educational leadership having previously been Executive Head Teacher, before taking up the post of CEO, which she has held for the last 2 years. Her focus, as the new CEO at Plymouth CAST will be on extending the sustainable delivery of the Trust’s Catholic mission and ensuring that our 7,250 pupils receive an outstanding educational experience across all 36 schools within the Trust. Zoe stated, ‘I am excited by the challenge of leading such a large Catholic Trust, and I look forward to working closely with the Head Teachers and the wider Trust team to build on the excellent progress made to date.’
Andy Nicholls
Vice Chair/Chair of Recruitment Panel