Tribute to Carol Adams, founding chief executive of the General Teaching Council for England
Mon, 15 Jan 2007 00:00:00

It is with great sadness that the General Teaching Council for England notifies the death of its founding chief executive, Carol Adams (22 Jan 2007).

Carol was recruited to establish the GTC, which launched in September 2000, bringing into reality the long held aspiration that teaching should have its own independent professional body. During her seven years as chief executive, Carol developed the GTC from a fledgling Council to a mature organisation with an authoritative body of policy and research work, a comprehensive register of 500 000 qualified teachers and fair and robust regulatory procedures. Carol was a passionate advocate for teachers and teaching and has made access to high quality professional development for teachers a central focus of the GTC’s work. She was particularly proud of the development of the GTC Teacher Learning Academy which offers teachers professional recognition for their learning and development work in school.

Before joining the GTC, Carol was chief education officer first in Wolverhampton and then in Shropshire.  She trained as a history teacher and remained a teacher first and foremost. During the 1980s she worked as an equality adviser for the Inner London Education Authority and published a series of books and articles on curriculum development and on equality in education, including The Gender Trap.

Carol continued to champion equality throughout her career. In all her work at the GTC she ensured that the Council focused on raising achievement for all pupils regardless of background. She was appointed as a Commissioner for the Commission for Racial Equality in 2006.

Carol will be remembered by colleagues and friends as an inspirational leader who was completely dedicated to the cause of high quality teaching. She believed that teaching is the most important job in society and spoke up for teachers and teaching at every opportunity.

Obituaries for Carol appeared in Seced magazine on 18 January 2007 and The Guardian and the Times Educational Supplement on 19 January 2007.