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Hello and welcome to Women with Balls, where I, Katie Balls, talk to today's trailblazers.

Today I'm delighted to be joined by Catherine Burwell Singh, the headmistress of Michaela Community School,

dubbed by some as Britain's strictest school. In 2010, Burbel Singh made headlines when she spoke at

Conservative Party conference, and in the process, alienated some of the teaching profession when she said at Conservative Party conference and in the process alienated

some of the teaching profession when she said, the system is broken because it keeps poor

children poor, criticising a culture of excuses of low standards and a sea of bureaucracy.

In 2014, she founded the Michaela Community School in Brent, North London, as part of the

Free Schools Revolution. Quickly nicknamed Britain Strictor's School, the project has made headlines

for its approach to discipline. The philosopher Roger Scruton has described Michaela as a model

that all our schools should imitate. Earlier this year, the school received its first round of GCSE results four

times better than the national average. So Catherine, thank you very much for joining us today.

So on this podcast, before we talk about your work at Michaela School and your career in education,

what we like to do is take stock by talking about briefly what you're doing before you entered

your field.

So you were born in New Zealand and you spent a lot of your childhood in Canada, is that correct?

That's right.

And your father was an education.

Yeah, he was a lecturer at university in Canada.

So from a young age, did you have an interest in it?

...