Jo Brassington ( they / them )
As a teacher, I have always been passionate about creating safe and inclusive educational spaces. I now work with schools, universities, charities, and businesses to support them in creating these spaces.
With my colleague Dr Adam Brett, I co-founded Pride & Progress: a podcast, platform, and community group amplifying the voices of LGBT+ educators, and explore ways to make our educational spaces more inclusive. This work is collated in our award-winning book: Pride & Progress: Making Schools LGBT+ Inclusive Spaces.
I also founded An Emotionally Honest Space to work with teachers to consciously construct emotionally honest spaceswhich support young people to notice, name, and navigate their emotions in an honest and healthy way. In 2022, we published our book: Bottled: A Picture Book to Help Children Share Their Feelings.
I am a qualified and experienced class teacher and leader who has spent their whole career working in education.
As of September 2024, I am a PhD Researcher at the University of Strathclyde. My research will explore the use and usefullness of LGBT+ Staff Networks in Education. If you'd like to discuss this research, please contact me.