Pam Fry - Chair
2024 Elected as Chair
2021 Elected as Vice Chair
Pam has had a long career working across all areas of Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND). She believes wholeheartedly in the Portage principles and in working in partnership with parents, carers, and extended family members.
In pursuit of her desire to ensure that all families in Sutton access the right support for their needs, she developed her non-profit company, PlayWise Learning CIC, working with children up to the age of eight years, with Portage principles and ethos at the heart of the service.
In March 2022, Pam was awarded an MBE for “Services to Disabled Children and Young People.” She is highly passionate about all things Portage and SEND, and she strives for equality for children with SEND and their families.
Email - chair@portage.org.uk
Glenys Creese, Vice Chair
2025 Elected as Vice Chair
Glenys has worked in early years since 2010, initially working for West Sussex Local Authority in a Children and Family Centre before moving into the charity sector in 2017 as Head of Service for the Dame Vera Lynn Children’s Charity. As Head of Service, Glenys completed her Portage training and gained the Stamp of Approval for the charity. In 2024, Dame Vera Lynn Children’s Charity became a Portage service in its own right.
In 2020, Glenys was appointed CEO of the charity and has supported its growth, both in the number of services offered to families and in the number of families it supports each week.
Glenys is passionate about equality and inclusion and about delivering the highest level of services to families. She strives to ensure that families who most need support receive the very best services.
Email - vice.chair@portage.org.uk
Juliet Davies - Quality Assurance & Development Trustee
2021 Co-opted to Board
2022 Elected as Quality Assurance & Development Trustee
Juliet’s professional heritage is firmly based within the Early Years sector, initially completing NNEB training and latterly M. A, ed with a dissertation focussing on the assessment of children with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND).
Through the setting up and managing of a Children’s Centre nursery Juliet worked with children that often have complex SEND/SEMH needs. As the designated SENCO Juliet became Portage trained in 2009, delivering Portage as outreach and sharing the Portage principles through courses that were delivered to parents. Juliet currently works as a Children’s Centre Coordinator for SEND and has developed a Portage service which she continues to manage and develop.
Juliet is immensely proud to be a trustee of the National Portage Association as the Portage ethos echoes her views that a participatory model of learning between the child, parents and professional delivers the best outcomes.
Most importantly Juliet has close personal experience of neurodiversity and celebrates the unique way this has opened her eyes to the highs and lows of living with additional needs.
Email - quality.assurance@portage.org.uk
Margje Nouwens - Treasurer
2021 Elected as Treasurer
Margje has a BA in Social Work and an MA in Childhood and Youth and has more than ten years of experience in the special needs sector. She currently works for KIDS, a national charity for children and young people with disabilities and developmental delays, and is the service manager for the Portage service in the London Borough of Southwark.
Margje enjoys serving on the board of trustees and contributing to the running of the NPA. She is interested in numbers, and the opportunity to extend her knowledge and experience through being the NPA Treasurer is very valuable to her.
Email - treasurer@portage.org.uk
Rachel Deacon - Members Trustee
2021 Co-opted to NPA Board
2022 Elected as Members Trustee
Rachel has been working as an early years educator since 2012. She started out as a nursery assistant and also has experience managing tuition centres, supporting children aged 5–18. She spent four years volunteering in orphanages in Malaysia, teaching English and maths. She graduated from university with a Master’s in Global Criminology in 2015, focusing her studies on crimes affecting children, particularly those with disabilities.
Rachel began working for KIDS in 2016 as a short breaks worker, then joined the Southwark Home Learning Portage team in 2018, becoming a qualified Portage practitioner. Having a family member with disabilities has given Rachel first-hand experience of the highs and lows of living with additional needs and the pressures on a family. This experience has enabled her to practice Portage with passion and strive to create an inclusive society for young people living with disabilities. She is very proud to represent the hardworking and dedicated members of the National Portage Association.
Email - members@portage.org.uk
Jenny Chapman - Services Trustee
2021 Co-opted to NPA Board
2022 Elected as Services Trustee
Jenny formally began her interest in Early Years when her youngest son started preschool. He struggled to settle, so she stayed with him for a few sessions and enjoyed it so much that she never left! She worked in an amazing private preschool for seven years, gaining experience and qualifications in Early Years. She then moved to Slough Nurseries, where she worked in their Children’s Centre. She has always felt a strong draw to children with additional needs, inclusion, and equality for all, and comes from a large and diverse family. A relocation near Reading, Berkshire in 2015 led to her joining the Local Portage team, where she has been working ever since.
She has a personal interest in supporting children with additional needs, having a son who is diagnosed autistic, and she truly believes in the valuable and fantastic service that Portage Home Visiting provides. Jenny has always believed that parents are children’s first and foremost educators and feels privileged to work as a Portage Home Visitor alongside them, supporting others through its principles and beliefs. She is empowered to support families and does so with the mantra of being the person she needed when her own son was younger.
Jenny is currently completing a degree in Autism and is a trained and experienced Intensive Interaction Coordinator.
After attending the NPA Development Day in 2021, Jenny realized what a valuable and exciting opportunity it would be to join the Board and support the Portage Association. She is enjoying her role so far and looks forward to sharing the Portage message far and wide, supporting services to offer the best home visiting service they can.
Email - services@portage.org.uk
Vina Mistry - Vice Chair of Training
2024 Co-opted to NPA Board
2024 Elected as Vice Chair of Training
Email - vicechair.training@portage.org.uk
Vina started her journey in the world of SEND in her twenties, working for Social Care and supporting adults with SEND and their families.
In 1986, her manager put her forward for a Portage Training Workshop, which literally changed her life. Children and Early Years then became her passion. She believes in the power of early intervention to make a difference for the children and families we work with.
She became a Portage Home Visitor and, since that time, has worked for three local authorities over the past 39 years, serving as a Portage Home Visitor, a SEN Co-ordinator for Early Years, managing both an Area SENCO Team and later an Early Support Key Worker team.
In 1997, she became an accredited trainer for the NPA and has provided Portage training workshops to nurseries, special schools, Early Years Teams, and Early Years Practitioners.
Vina wants to continue promoting and strengthening the importance of training practitioners, spreading the knowledge and value of Portage principles, and embedding them in practice with the children, parents, families, and practitioners we are privileged to work with.
After years of considering joining the NPA Board, she applied for the role of Vice Chair of Training and is committed to making a positive difference to the work and ethos of the National Portage Association, and to advancing the principles we promote in Portage services across the country.
Lauren Williams - Parent Rep
2024 Elected as Parent Rep
Lauren has over a decade of experience working in education, and now works with her local Portage team as an Early Support Coordinator. As the parent of a disabled child, Lauren has a personal understanding of the challenges faced by families of children with additional needs and disabilities. This experience has fuelled a passion for representing the voices of other parent carers and advocating for inclusive education for all children.
Lauren is excited to bring her perspective as both a professional and a parent carer to the Board of the NPA, with the goal of ensuring that the voices of families are integral to shaping the future of Portage and other support services.
Email - parents@portage.org.uk
Sarah Worlidge - Social Media Trustee
2024 Elected as Social Media Trustee
Sarah has worked in child development for over 25 years. She began her career in nursery and pre-school and continued her studies to obtain a BA (Hons) degree in Early Childhood and Youth Studies. During her time in early years, she discovered a real passion for working with children with SEND and pursued this further by securing a job at a school for children with complex needs, where she worked for over 12 years before having her own children.
On returning to work, Sarah joined the Sure Start Children’s Centres as a family practitioner and developed a strong interest in working with families. It was here that she was introduced to Portage and completed the workshop and core competencies while delivering Portage in partnership with Norfolk Portage Service. When a permanent post on the core team at Norfolk Portage became available, she jumped at the chance and has never left! She is now the Senior Portage Practitioner for East Norfolk, an accredited Portage Trainer, and enjoys delivering workshops to help others discover their love for Portage and the ‘small steps approach’.
Sarah loves the ethos and principles behind Portage and continues to enjoy sharing these messages with families and settings every day. She is extremely grateful to join the NPA Board as Social Media Trustee and looks forward to reaching more people online to spread Portage awareness and showcase the wonderful work our Portage practitioners do every day.
Email - social.media@portage.org.uk
Sarah Moore - Members Support Trustee
2025 Elected as Members Support Trustee
Sarah Moore is an experienced early years practitioner with over 15 years of dedicated service supporting children and families. Her journey into early years began after the birth of her two sons, initially volunteering as a committee member for her local pre-school. She later became a Home-Start volunteer, providing support to families with young children in the home for four years.
In 2015, Sarah achieved a BA in Childhood and Youth Studies, which paved the way for her role in a local pre-school, where she developed a strong interest in special educational needs, a passion inspired by her eldest son’s diagnosis of Auditory Processing Disorder.
In 2021, Sarah joined Torbay Council as a Portage Home Visitor, contributing to the team’s success in achieving five-star accreditation from the National Portage Association (NPA). She is committed to continuous professional development, having completed her Level 3 Award in Portage and is currently working towards accredited trainer status for Portage workshop delivery.
Sarah is passionate about empowering children, families, and practitioners through inclusive and supportive practices. She is excited to begin her role as a Trustee for the NPA, where she looks forward to championing the vital work of this charity and its services.
email - members.support@portage.org.uk
Kim Hannay-Young - Services Support Trustee
2025 Elected as Serices Support Trustee
Kim has been working within SEND for over 30 years. She trained as an NNEB and went on to complete a Foundation Degree as a mature student in 2005. She has held a variety of roles, including nanny, nursery nurse within a special school in London, area SENCo, 1-to-1 support in a nursery, teaching assistant within a resource unit, and became a Portage Home Visitor in Wiltshire in 2000.
Kim completed her Portage training in the 1980s at a special school but began delivering Portage when she joined Wiltshire Portage in 2000. Wiltshire Portage is a small independent charity, and she was fortunate to be offered the position of Service Manager, overseeing the team and Portage delivery.
During her time as manager, she continued to support families directly by delivering Portage. As a small charity, she and the team have faced numerous challenges, including commissioning changes, charity mergers, team integration and development, fundraising, recruiting trustees, and evolving delivery and paperwork to meet the needs of families, staff, and commissioners.
Kim is a firm believer in the ethos and principles of Portage and is passionate about the positive impact it has on children and their parents, empowering families through its approach.
email - services.support@portage.org.uk