former soldier; former executive and non-executive director
The son of a diplomat, Andrew Graham was commissioned into The Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders before joining the Army and going up to Cambridge. He commanded 1st Battalion The Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders and 3 Brigade in Northern Ireland, completed 3 tours in the Ministry of Defence, instructed at the Army Staff College and lead the Army’s Recruiting and Training Division responsible for turning ‘citizens to soldiers’. He deployed to Baghdad as deputy commanding general of Multinational Corps Iraq in 2004. His final tour of duty was as director general of the Defence Academy. He has worked in industry and headed a charity developing the resilience and confidence of young people through challenging expeditions. In 2019 he handed over as chair of trustees at Combat Stress, the veterans’ mental health charity after 6 years, and as chair of the Audit and Risk Assurance Committee at the Department for Work and Pensions after 5 years. Non-family interests include piping, outdoor sports of all kinds, the fortunes of Liverpool FC, destructive gardening, keeping bees, pickling and puddings, reading (history, travel and a good novel for choice).
Sir Oliver was the Member of Parliament for West Dorset from 1997 until his retirement in 2019. From 2010, he was the Minister for Government Policy and subsequently Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster in David Cameron’s coalition government. After the 2015 General Election, he continued as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, and was in overall charge of the Cabinet Office, until July 2016. Before 2010, he held the positions of Shadow Home Secretary, Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer, Shadow Secretary of State for Food and Rural Affairs and Chairman of the Conservative Party Policy Review. He is also currently Vice-President of the Great Britain China Centre (GBCC), Chairman of the Red Tape Initiative (RTI) and Senior Advisor to the Faraday Institute. Educated at Cambridge University, Princeton University and London Business School, he has also had a varied career beyond front-line politics – having been a research fellow at Cambridge University, a civil servant and a bank director. He is the author of several books on politics, economics and philosophy, as well as many pamphlets and articles. He became a privy councillor in 2002 and was knighted in 2016.
Dr David James is deputy head academic at Bryanston School, an HMC boarding school in Dorset. He has previously worked in a number of high-profile public schools including Wellington College, and was seconded to the Department for Education to work on an independent/state schools partnership project. David is a team inspector for ISI and was recently appointed to their Education Advisory Forum. He is a columnist for the Times Education Supplement, and has co-edited two books: World Class and, more recently, The State of Independence: key challenges facing private schools today, both published by Routledge. He is an editor for Cambridge University Press’s ‘School Shakespeare’ series. David was appointed the first Zagat Global Fellow at Riverdale School in New York, an initiative to promote closer links between schools across the world.
James has served as an Army Officer from 1978 to 1987 in the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders. On retiring his commission in 1987 he joined the drinks industry in 1987 as an Area Manager for Whitbread running Pubs, Hotels and Restaurants. He then moved to a regional brewer, Maclays of Alloa, in Scotland as retail director and then as managing director. In 2004 he retrained as a yacht broker and became managing director of the yacht brokerage arm of Dubois Yachts – specialising in the design, build and sale of sailing super yachts up to 60 metres in length. He left this post in 2008 and worked for a variety of yacht companies under the banner of his yachting consultancy business, Lymington Yachts. He moved to Dorset in 2017 when his wife became Head of English at Sherborne Girls School. He is now launching a new beer brand. He has enjoyed working alongside his wife judging debates over the past 2 years.
Crispin manages oXya UK, which provides technical IT support to companies running SAP business software. An ex-teacher, he also writes and speaks on the theory and philosophy of education, particularly with a view to making better use in the sector of digital technology and blogs on technology and education at www.EdTechNow.net.
Dyane Neiman is New York-bred, Berlin-based speaker coach and a former award-winning dance choreographer and theatre director. With her company Moving Speaker, she helps people share their ideas on public stages such as TEDx, Berlin Science Week, Creative Bureaucracy Festival.
Dyane also directs Berlin’s popular open stage for true stories called THE bEAR and produces a bi-weekly podcast called True Stories Berlin.
Read On is written in easy English and, together with its educational material (audios and worksheets), it is ideal for middle-school students.
World and Press is a compilation of original newspaper articles from The Times, The Guardian, and The New York Times, among others.
A premium subscription to World and Press (newspaper with educational material) is perfect for students preparing to take the Abitur exam in English. It’s also perfect for students preparing for Debating Matters.
That’s why die Sprachzeitung is rewarding the winning school of the Debating Matters Berlin Championship with a premium subscription to World and Press for one year!
Niels Betori Diehl was born in Rome in 1975 and has lived in Berlin since 1999. As an artist with a background in design and architecture, he works in a variety of media such as video, sculpture, installation and writing. Since 2005 he collaborates with Barbara K. Prokop as NBDBKP. Together they work on interior design projects, interdisciplinary large-scale exhibitions and publications, and organise panel discussions based on topics arising in their individual research and practices. Currently, NBDBKP is working on an online web shop project that blurs the line between art and marketing, combining political and social issues with easy-to-wear pieces. Niels has a BFA in Architecture from Università degli Studi di Roma and Kunsthochschule Berlin-Weissensee, and a BFA/MFA in Visual Culture Studies from Universität der Künste, Berlin.
head of legal department, Syndikusrechtsanwältin, H2air
Tamara works as the head of legal department for H2air, a French company dealing with renewables energies. She was admitted as Rechtsanwältin to the German bar in 2003.
freelance communications & circular economy consultant, Phenomenal Words
Phoebe grew up in Paris and the UK prior to studying French and German literature at Oxford, Bonn and Hamburg universities. She has worked in administrative and communication roles at Yahoo! in Munich, French energy group EDF and for the cultural attaché at the French Embassy in London. In 2012, she undertook a solo tour of Russia and Asia, photographing dustbins for an exhibition shown in Paris and Berlin. Today she works freelance as a language trainer, editor and circular economy expert at Phenomenal Words, which she founded in 2014. She has given over 60 workshops and talks on circularity and trained 150+ students to improve their English. Her interests include singing in a choir, literature and new words.
