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BAISIS/BSA – Visa and immigration summer term conference

Name: BAISIS/BSA – Visa and immigration summer term conference
Start: 2024-05-21T09:30:00+01:00
End: 2024-05-21T16:15:00+01:00
Location: Virtual – Zoom

May 21 @ 9:30 am - 4:15 pm

Date: May 21, 2024
Time: 09:30 – 16:15
Cost: BAISIS/BSA Full Member – £215, BAISIS/BSA Additional Member Fee – £110, BSA Affiliate Member – £325, BSA Additional Affiliate Member Fee – £140, Non-member – £430
Audience: Admissions, Marketing, Deputy Head, Head of Boarding, Head, Bursar, Educational Guardians, Agents.
Platform: Zoom (online) – conference

Course outline

This conference will enable delegates to hear directly from the experts on the latest in visas and immigration relevant to the education sector. The summer update will address key issues from members at a crucial time of year for international student recruitment.

BSA will facilitate questions directly from members to our experts throughout the day, including Home Office representatives. Delegates are welcome to send their questions in advance to bsa@boarding.org.uk to ensure these are answered during the session.

Sponsored by IGTM

Training topics will include:

Key sector issues relating to visas and immigration
Maintaining sponsor licence compliance
International student recruitment risk assessments and due diligence considerations
Sponsor duties, including Monitoring, Reporting and Record-keeping Managing the SMS, CAS allocations and your BCA
UKVI inspections and educational oversight
Relationships with educational agents

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Programme:

09:30 – 09:45

Session 1 – Welcome and update: immigration state of the nation

A review of where we are now as a sector and what’s to come.

Speaker: Kate Hollyer, Director of Legal and Public Affairs, BSA Group

09:45 – 10:15

Session 2 – Preparing for induction, best practice for welcoming your international students

This session will hear from current sponsors on their integration and induction processes from a sponsorship perspective and focusing on their new international students.

Chair: Beth Waddington, Director, BAISIS
- Speaker: Johanna Prior, Joint Principal, The International College, King’s School, Canterbury
- Joanna Jackson, International Registrar, Sherborne School
- Laura Brayley, Assistant Head TSI (Pastoral & Co-Curricular)

10:15 – 10:30

Break

10:30 – 11:15

Session 3 – Promoting positive and transparent relationships with educational agents

This session will bring together voices from boarding schools with international students and BSA certified educational agents to discuss how to promote positive relationships between the two, focusing on the sponsor duties and wellbeing and care of the child.

Chair: Caroline Nixon, International Director, BSA Group
- Speaker: Gemma Kilby, Head of Admissions, Felsted School
- Lauren Moore, International Compliance Officer, Felsted School
- Theresa Glasmacher, Managing Director, Barbara Glasmacher, Internationale Schulberatung

11:15 – 11:30

Break

11:30 – 12:30

Session 4 – Exploitation risks and due diligence

This session will be focused on helping schools to be aware of and safeguard their international students whilst best protecting themselves and their international students against exploitation.

Chair: Kate Hollyer, Director of Legal and Public Affairs, BSA Group
- Speakers: Mark Taylor, Consultant, Verisio
- Andrew Steven, Director at I-GTM

12:30 – 13:30

Lunch

13:30 – 14:30

Session 5 – Home Office: Policy and Operations update

Hear from representatives of the Home Office Study Operations and Student Policy departments about the Child Student / Student visa routes and future developments, plus pose your questions to the team – an unmissable session!

Chair: Kate Hollyer, Director of Legal and Public Affairs, BSA Group
- Speaker: Martyn Foulds, Team Leader, Study Operations, Home Office

14:30 – 14:45

Break

14:45 – 15:45

Session 6 – Legal update: UKVI compliance and Educational Oversight

An overview of compliance trends and areas of focus from leading immigration expert and Chair of Immigration Law Practitioners’ Association (ILPA)

Chair: Beth Waddington, Director, BAISIS
- Speaker: Hazar El–Chamaa, Immigration Partner, Penningtons Manches Cooper LLP and Chair, ILPA

15:45 – 16:15

Session 7 – In conversation with immigration experts.

Put your questions to the legal panel and hear a round-up of the day.

Chair: Beth Waddington, Director, BAISIS
- Speaker: Kate Hollyer, Director of Legal and Public Affairs, BSA Group
- Hazar El-Chamaa, Immigration Partner, Penningtons Manches Cooper LLP and Chair, ILPA

16:15

Close of conference

Kate Hollyer, Director of Legal and Public Affairs, BSA Group

Kate is Legal and Public Affairs Director of BSA Group and Director of BSA Group Legal Services Ltd, BSA Group’s SRA-regulated law firm. As a qualified solicitor of England and Wales with more than 12 years’ experience advising clients on UK immigration and nationality law, Kate supports members with all UK immigration matters including UKVI sponsor licence compliance. Kate is a member of the Home Office Education Advisory Group and is the boarding sector representative for this group. Prior to joining BSA in 2022 Kate was Partner and Head of Department at a leading full-service UK law firm. Having resided in state, preparatory and senior school boarding houses since 2014 with her Housemaster husband, Kate has a unique perspective of boarding life.

Beth Waddington, Director, BAISIS

Bethan Waddington joined the BSA team as Training Manager in September 2017. Bethan has worked in two independent boarding schools in the UK and Switzerland, the latter as Housemistress to 36 pupils. Following her time in Switzerland, she was a Pastoral Manager for an inner-city state academy before working in the charity sector for Debrett’s running the ‘Debrett’s Foundation’ training programme.

In her role, Bethan plans and manages all Day Seminars, Conferences, INSET and Consultancy, as well as being Director of BAISIS. She believes boarding can be a positive force for young people and in order to fully support their needs staff can never learn too much. As such she is passionate about the CPD BSA delivers to our pastoral communities in the UK and worldwide.

Caroline Nixon, International Director, BSA Group

Caroline has worked in international education for over 30 years. She is International & Membership Director at Boarding Schools’ Association, and Director of Caroline Nixon Education Ltd., as well as a member of the advisory group to the British Government’s All Party Parliamentary Group for international students.

Caroline set up and runs the BSA educational agent certification scheme and is involved with the BSA’s accreditation of international schools. Her background is in international education marketing and she also set up and ran a leading international school in the UK. She has helped several UK schools to establish new overseas branches, advised an international school opening in the UK, set up a guardianship agency for an educational group, and advises schools on international marketing and academic and pastoral provision for their international students.

Johanna Prior, Joint Principal, The International College, King’s School, Canterbury

Jo Prior grew up in Germany and attended university in England and France. Following a degree in English and French, she lived and worked in China, before completing teacher training in Scotland. She was a Teacher, Boarding Tutor, UCAS Advisor and Head of Year at Loretto before joining King’s as founding Principal of the International College.

Joanna Jackson, International Registrar, Sherborne School

Joanna joined Sherborne School in 2011, working at Sherborne International, where she gained extensive knowledge and experience of the requirements and needs of international students. In 2021 she moved across to Sherborne School’s Admissions Department where she is currently International Registrar. Joanna has travelled extensively and has vast experience supporting pupils through the admissions journey and assisting them with their visa applications. Prior to joining Sherborne, Joanna worked for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and an international pharmaceutical training company.

Gemma Kilby, Head of Admissions, Felsted School

Gemma is Head of Admissions & International Registrar at Felsted. Prior to working for Felsted, Gemma was an EAL teacher and taught in China for two years, bringing an exciting cultural understanding to the Admissions Office at Felsted. Following her past experience in teaching overseas, Gemma has a passion for the promotion of internationalism in education, along with a desire to promote the benefits that boarding at school can bring for both UK and overseas students.

Lauren Moore, International Compliance Officer, Felsted School

Lauren Moore is the International Compliance Officer at Felsted School and responsible for ensuring the compliance of Home Office and UKVI guidance and regulations across the school. This includes the issuance of the school’s CAS documents, monitoring of pupils’ travel and care arrangements during holidays and ensuring all documents and records relating to sponsored pupils and the schools sponsor licence are up to date and accurate.

Prior to working for Felsted, Lauren worked in the aviation industry travelling around the world, where she enjoyed experiencing and learning about different cultures.

Theresa Glasmacher, Managing Director, Barbara Glasmacher, Internationale Schulberatung

Theresa Glasmacher is Managing Director of Glasmacher Schulberatung, an agency specialized on the placement of students from Germany, Austria and Switzerland in British boarding schools. After having spent her Sixth Form at a UK boarding school herself, Theresa first did a banking apprenticeship in Munich. She then studied history and politics at the London School of Economics and at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy (Tufts University) in Boston. After university, Theresa worked in the field of environmental and climate protection in Munich and Berlin, where she was involved in Poland, Hungary and Estonia’s processes of becoming EU members. She joined the family business Glasmacher Schulberatung in 2006 and for many years worked alongside her famous mother Barbara. She has been the agency’s Managing Director since 2013.

Martyn Foulds, Team Leader, Study Operations, Home Office

Hazar El–Chamaa, Immigration Partner, Penningtons Manches Cooper LLP and Chair, ILPA

Hazar has over eight years’ immigration experience and has been advising education providers on all aspects of compliance, restructuring and business strategies since the inception of Tier 4. Her experience also includes advising on appeals, judicial review applications and challenges to Home Office decisions which affect sponsors. Hazar is a frequent speaker on immigration law and gives training on sponsor compliance and prevention of illegal working. She is an elected executive committee member of ILPA (Immigration Law Practitioners’ Association) and has been recommended by the Chambers Guide to the UK Legal Profession. Penningtons is recognised as a key link between the Home Office and educational institutions in the process of implementing and working through PBS reform.

Mark Taylor, Consultant, Verisio Ltd

In a previous reincarnation Mark founded The Taylor Partnership – supporting U.K. independent schools in meeting the compliance demands of their UKVI sponsor licences and training many school staff. More recently, after travelling the world, Mark has identified the increased risk to independent schools as a result of the need for greater probity and due diligence in financial awareness of school suppliers, parents and agents. Mark’s interest in this field was first sparked in 2016-17 when he supported a number of schools following the disappearance of students from Vietnam.

Mark is working in partnership with Verisio, a specialist organisation concentrating on integrity and due diligence checks on corporations and individuals.

Andrew Steven, Co-Founder of I-GTM

Andrew Steven is the co-founder of I-GTM, a company established to meet the unique requirements of boarding schools. I-GTM provides a centralised system designed to streamline the process of reminding parents, collecting information, and ensuring the checks and balances essential for compliance and safeguarding oversight.

His deep technical expertise, combined with an understanding of the practical challenges faced by school administrators and transport teams, has been crucial in developing I-GTM. This solution, crafted by a UK-based development team, tackles the issues related to travel and whereabouts for boarding schools.

Before founding I-GTM, Andrew was a partner at BDP, a software company offering a SaaS solution for the Scottish conveyancing market. Under his leadership, BDP experienced significant growth and was successfully sold in 2016 marking a notable milestone in his career and underscoring his ability to drive growth and deliver value in the tech industry.

Andrew Steven’s IT career spans several decades, beginning in the late 90s with roles in web design and e-commerce. This experience has honed his ability to communicate complex technical concepts effectively to both developers and users. With a passion for technology and a proven track record of delivering impactful solutions, Andrew continues to drive innovation at I-GTM, ensuring that the company’s clients receive the highest level of service and support.

Laura Brayley, Assistant Head TSI (Pastoral & Co-Curricular)