College Websites

Clare Brown

Clare Brown is our Principal at EKC Folkestone College. Clare worked in banking for several years before retraining and working as an English teacher in Adult Education. She joined the Further Education sector in 2013, initially working as an Advanced Learning Practitioner and lecturer in Teacher Education.

She has worked in several FE colleges in leadership and management roles and prior to moving to Folkestone as Principal, was an Assistant Principal in a South London college.

Clare is driven by the passion to motivate young people and adults who are returning to education to seize opportunities and to succeed in an aspirational, engaging and supportive learning environment.

In her spare time, Clare enjoys running and cycling, and is an avid follower of UK athletics. When not doing something active, she relishes the time she spends with her family and friends.

Previous Principals/CEOs

Neala Whybrow

Having trained and worked professionally as a Musical Theatre performer, Neala (somewhat reluctantly) fell into teaching as a Performing Arts teacher at her old secondary school in 2008. However, what Neala quickly realised was that inspiring young people to be ambitious and that moment when “the penny drops” was infectious, particularly with learners that others had "written off".

After eight years of working in various leadership roles in secondary environments, Neala wanted to explore leadership outside of secondary education; feeling her curriculum design and stakeholder engagement was somewhat restricted by the progress measures set in schools. Neala took the leap of moving into Further Education as Head of Creative at Broadstairs College in 2016.

In 2017, Neala was appointed as Deputy Principal Inclusion and School for Broadstairs College, taking on the senior responsibility of our flagship Junior College. Neala was fundamental in redesigning the Junior College and, since doing so, took a secondment role as group Director of Pre 16 Development and was integral in establishing Junior College provision at both Folkestone and Spring Lane.

As a result of the group success in pre-16 and inclusion, in 2020, Neala moved into the role of Group Director of Inclusion and Alternate Provision with the role evolving in 2021 to Director of Education Improvement. It was during this time that Neala established a strong approach to Quality Assurance across the group as well as launching and embedding the group’s Inclusion Strategy. Since then, Neala has completed her National Professional Qualification of Headship and hopes to one day bring her knowledge for secondary education and FE together and would love nothing more than to do that in a way which benefits our local communities.

Neala is married with two children. As a family, they are actively involved in charity work, specifically for Diabetes UK, a charity very close to their hearts. Neala is also a Governor at Bysing Wood Primary School, within the EKC Schools Trust, and plans on undertaking her MA in Inclusion (SEMH) next year.