Who we are

Leap Specialist Trainers and Consultants

Leap Confronting Conflict’s training courses and consultancies are delivered by a highly skilled and committed team of freelance trainers, drawn from a diverse range of backgrounds and specialisms.

Allison Gibbs

Allison started working with Leap in 2004. She has many years of experience working with young people, and people with issues around substance misuse. Allison has delivered lots of Leap’s schools programmes, has supported a wide range of Peerlink events, and has mentored many of Leap’s Young Trainers. She is currently training to be an NLP practitioner.

Amanda Nelmes

Amanda has delivered work for Leap since 1998. As a Senior Trainer for the organisation she is skilled in the delivery of all Leap programmes and adult training. She specialises in working with excluded and vulnerable young people in the community, and institutional change using the “whole school approach”. Amanda has also been a trainer for Tiger Monkey UK Ltd, and a full time freelancer; her previous clients include Brent Youth Service, Brent Irish Advisory Service, and Broadway.

Andy Jukes

Andy had extensive experience leading distinction based personal development work to adults as well as working as a connexions advisor to young people when he joined Leap on the Gangs & Territorialism project in 05.
After two years delivering partnership projects he went on to consult for Social Enterprise, specialising in working with gangs and YPs at risk. He also has a particular interest in outdoor experiential learning.

Ann Lukens

Ann Lukens started working with Leap in 2008. She’s been mediating, facilitating and training for 13 years, and before that was very corporate. She enjoys working with primary school students (and the adults too) creating their missions and visions for their schools. She also really enjoys working with groups of all ages to explore what they need and want, and put plans in place to achieve their goals.

Carey Haslam

Carey is one of Leap’s most long-standing Senior Trainers, and has worked for the organisation since 1992. In that time she has been involved in developing much of Leap’s training, and has delivered the whole range of Leap’s courses to adults, and to young people in schools and Young Offender Institutions. Recently, Carey has developed new training materials on race and diversity, and has been involved with piloting programmes with Youth Access and the British Institute of Human Rights. She is a consultant on the Sport Relief project. Carey is a practicing community mediator, facilitator and supervisor. The heart of her work is enabling others to use conflict as an opportunity to create positive change. When not working, Carey’s aim is to visit as many countries as she is years old.

Carol Hope

Carol has been a mediator and trained people in mediation since 1991. She was the director of Family Mediation Lothian for 9 years. Carol has worked as a tutor and trainer for 28 years. She is currently developing a peer mediation programme for looked after young people. Her training for adults has included conflict management skills to child care officers and mediation skills to family lawyers. She also has experience of catering for learners with special education needs.

Cathy Warren

Cathy is a graduate of Bristol University and has a Masters in Organisation Psychology from Birkbeck College. She has been a community mediator since 1992 and started training mediators in 1997. She uses her mediation and training skills in a variety of settings including schools and Youth Offending Teams. Currently she is manager of mediation services for Age Concern as well as being part of a project concerned with changing the way schools approach conflict. She has authored to short books about the use of restorative approaches in schools. Cathy loves all kinds of visual arts and is a keen photographer. She enjoys exploring remoter parts of the world, with camera in hand.

Claudine Rane

Claudine works with a variety of organisations who work with young people and adults including the British Youth Council, the National Children’s Bureau, Victim Support, and several restorative justice organisations. Claudine has experience in conflict resolution and mediation in criminal justice, and delivers training around these areas as well as youth justice, youth work, social care matters and the effects of crime. She enjoys working at grassroots as well as supporting other peoples’ learning through training. Claudine has worked in the voluntary sector as well as statutory, and now works part-time, alongside her freelance work, at the Youth Justice Board.

Clifton McDonald

Clifton is a qualified Youth and Community Worker with over 20 years experience working with young people, and more recently as a trainer & workshop facilitator. He has worked with a wide variety of organisations in the public, statutory and voluntary sectors including his role as programme manager for The Children’s Society’s Genesis Project, supporting schools, children, young people and families in primary and secondary education. In working non-confrontationally, Clifton is committed to his own, as well as the personal, self and spiritual development and growth of those he works with.

Geoff Kayum

Prior to joining Leap Geoff spent 4 years working with Youth at Risk in a variety of roles. He also taught in a New Learning Centre, working with excluded YPs with learning difficulties across the ages of 3 – 25, though mainly in their early teens.
He initially worked with Leap from 2998 to 2003. During this time he delivered our Leadership programme in several YOI’s and led the delivery teams for mediation training in many schools. He has also trained as a mediator with Newham Conflict and Change.
Alongside his work with Leap Geoff also trained as a Steiner teacher and worked as a learning assistant.

Gill Barn

Gill has over 25 years experience of working with and for children and young people. She has held project management, development and training roles in the voluntary sector, working on children and young people’s rights and participation for Save the Children, Children’s Rights Officers and Advocates, The Children’s Society and Children’s Rights Alliance for England. She has led two national training programmes for children and young people i.e. ‘Ready Steady Change’ and ‘Training the Trainers for Total Respect’. Gill has also worked in local authority social services with young offenders and looked after children and young people.

Hannah Grant

Hannah is an applied theatre practitioner and youth worker, and joined Leap as a freelance trainer in 2008. She has worked in a number of different youth and school settings delivering workshops on many themes, with the ultimate goal of providing young people with a forum to explore issues that are relevant to them and their communities. Hannah has been a youth worker and informal educator for nine years, and also currently works as a part time education officer for the Jewish Council for Racial Equality.

Helen Tanner

Helen is a qualified Dramatherapist (LLB, PGdip DTh) running her own Practice. She has worked both nationally and internationally facilitating groups in a wide variety of settings. She spent seven years developing a model using creativity in working with drug addiction. She then went to work in New Zealand and onto post-conflict Kosovo and Belfast. Her recent projects include working with Women with post natal depression, and young people at risk of exclusion from school. She is currently studying for a Masters in Conflict Resolution at Bradford Peace Studies Centre, and supporting two local Yorkshire Schools in developing a Creative Curriculum. For fun she likes to travel, go on adventures with friends and do textile arts.

Isaac Ngugi

Isaac has been a Leap trainer since 2004, specialising in delivering conflict resolution and behaviour management in Primary schools. He has also helped to set-up peer mediation services for Key Stage 2, and taught on adult training sessions for learning mentors, teaching assistants and youth workers. Before joining Leap, Isaac formed a theatre company that specialised in drama and physical theatre, and has been a freelance teacher in the community theatre arts field for the past 15 years.

Jassy Denison

Jassy has delivered training for Leap since 2004, and has many years’ experience in the field of community development and engagement. She has delivered much of Leap’s schools work, and often delivers adult training.

Jim Pope

Jim joined the Leap team in 2008. He has a BA Hons in Theatre Arts, and his experience includes working with the National Youth Theatre delivering Open College Network courses for Young People at Risk.

Joanna Kinsella

Jo first came to Leap as a volunteer before joining the organisation’s Apprentice Trainer Scheme. Since then she has delivered extensively on the schools programme.

Kate Graham

Kate’s background is international development and most recently in helping voluntary sector organisations to measure the results of their work. Several of the outcomes tools she has co-developed are available online, with one for the homeless sector downloaded some 10,000 times. She is a certified NLP trainer and has trained teachers, managers and young people in basic NLP techniques.
Her training includes an MSc in International Policy Studies and MA in Conflict Resolution which she is currently undertaking in Bradford. She is also a mediator with community resolve.

Kathryn Becher

Kathryn spent a year with Leap as a Quaker Peace and Social Witness-sponsored volunteer intern, before going on to paid employment with the organisation as a Schools Development Worker. She moved to Bradford to study for a Peace Studies MA, while working for Leap as a freelance trainer and helping to run the Young Trainer’s Programme. She is currently working in Kenya with Action for Children in Conflict.

Katharine Yates

Katharine trained at Jacques Lecoq in Paris and studied Drama and French at Bristol University. She has worked internationally as a performer, teacher and workshop leader. She is passionate about using movement and physicality as a way of understanding human behaviour and sees working in conflict resolution as a way to develop her knowledge and expertise in this area. She enjoys using theatre techniques to engage young people and adults and strongly believes that learning at whatever stage in life should be fun! Katharine recently delivered a workshop on Body Confidence for Clean Break and is currently developing a series of workshops on play for adults. She enjoys yoga and dancing and is aiming to train as a yoga instructor.

Kweku Aacht

Kweku Aacht is a Hackney-based artist who’s been working as a facilitator and youth worker for over 10 years. Kweku initially began working with Leap through his job as outreach worker for Hackney Mediation Service in 2006, connecting the PeerLink programme to Hackney where he is a volunteer mediator. As a facilitator he’s worked with various organisations including Hackney Empire, Transport for London and the Peabody Trust, delivering a range of subjects from music production to peer mediation.

Lee Henry

Lee has over 16 years experience of sports coaching with YP in his role in Leeds City Council’s Community Sports dept.
He has worked on projects with Gypsies and Travellers Exchange & Stop Hate UK and delivered work in primary & secondary schools as well as community settings.
He provides safeguarding and child safety training for his colleagues in Leeds Council and is the Equity Officer for his department. Lee has also represented Great Britain at the 2009 Seniors World Cup in Thailand, where they won!

Macarena Mata-Porras

Macarena started working with Leap in 2008. She has delivered courses on Conflict Resolution and Mediation to children in schools with Mediation Hertfordshire and to young executives with Capable Dynamics, and courses on personal growth with the Template Foundation.

Matt Lent

Matt is a qualified community and youth worker. He has worked in the voluntary sector for over 15 years in a variety of settings, including detached work with homeless people, residential centres for young people and community based youth work. Through his role as Director of Operations for Schools Councils UK, he worked with hundreds of schools on issues of inclusion, participation and citizenship. Matt currently works on a number of initiatives including the DCSF Gifted and Talented Education Strand, enterprise education and youth sector workforce development. He has travelled extensively, most recently spending a year in Central and South America. Matt has two children and with the little spare time he has he likes to play board games, football and squash.

Meenakshi Sharma

Meenakshi recently joined Leap as a freelance trainer, and is currently working for Conflict & Change as a primary and secondary schools trainer on Peer Mediation and Valuing Diversity programmes.

Nia Imani Kuumba

Nia first worked with Leap as a theatre director on a project working with young homeless people, then in 2001 joined the organisation fulltime as a Gangs and Territorialism worker. He spent three years developing a ground-breaking group work programme for young people and gangs, and co-authored Leap’s manual, Working with Gangs and Young People. Originally a trained actor, Nia has worked since 1984 with young people and professionals in the Caribbean, Europe and the USA and is one of Leap’s most Senior Trainers. He is very interested in young men’s transition to adulthood, and works internationally with many groups in this area.

Nick Osbourne

Nick began working with Leap in 2008. He also works freelance as a trainer, coach, facilitator, mediator and consultant. Nick believes that in a world characterised by a bewildering pace of change, we cannot control what happens to us but we can choose our responses. After studying philosophy, Nick became an activist and worked on a variety of social and environmental campaigns. He has worked with Amnesty International, saved South American rainforests and set up ecovillages. More recently Nick has worked for 5 years for Changemakers, an educational charity promoting youth-led community action. Nick loves surfing and kite-surfing and would love to jump off a cliff with a paraglider on his back.

Nick Patel

Started his journey with Leap as a participant on Quarrelshop before joining the Young Mediators Network as a member and then as chairperson for the steering group. He worked full time for Leap as a member of the Yorkshire team delivering Pathfinder, our high capacity schools mediation training project before returning to work as a freelance trainer.
Nick has experience delivering our accredited work in and out of schools and often works on our residentials. He also performs as a DJ and magician!

Nigel Williams

Nigel joined Leap in 1996, arriving from the North of England where he had been studying Youth and Community Work in Manchester. Returning to London, he continued his career as an informal educator by joining the Waltham Forest Youth Service, where he is currently employed as lead manager for volunteering. Nigel believes in using drama and theatre techniques to support the learning process. He studied at Goldsmiths College for his Masters Degree in theatre and education, and has completed all the Boal workshops hosted by Adrian Jackson and facilitated by Augusto Boal. Nigel is very happy in his life, and enjoys the responsibility of being part of a family. He is in the process of developing a dream that one day he will spend some time watching the sun go down.

Nik Pitcher

Nik began her career with Leap in 1999. A Senior Trainer, she has delivered and developed many of Leap’s courses, specialising in working with young people in gangs, sport and conflict. Nik treasures the moments when participants feel they have a different choice in a difficult or challenging situation. Her background is in fine art and performance, and she has worked as a drama therapist for 15 years, initially focussing on young people and adults with disabilities. Nik is particularly interested in working with returning members of the armed forces who choose to work with young people, as well as managing services which provide training in the UK, Eastern Europe and the USA. Nik loves to play outside with her 3-year-old daughter, dig, keep bees and make felt! She would love next to travel to remote regions of Mongolia.

Nik Rabbani-Barker

Nik joined Leap in 2008. For the past nine years she has created a series of bold training programmes that combine practical brain science with attitudinal change. Each course provides practical mental tools to challenge disempowering belief systems. Nik worked for many years in the field of mental health and homelessness, developing creative ways of working with clients experiencing mental distress, ranging from mild depression to active schizophrenia. Nik believes that we are incredibly powerful beings each with unique abilities, and as we leap beyond our own personal fears and limitations our efforts can resonate on a larger scale. Nik would love to take flying lessons, and is currently writing a book.

Petra Hilgers

Petra is a development practitioner with experience in personal, team & organisational and community development as well as a bag full of memories from living and working within countries in armed conflicts.
As a development practitioner Petra is passionate about supporting people to make changes that are positive for them; she has expertise in developing alternative education and peer support programmes and has worked as a mediator in East London for 2 years. Petra is currently developing her own company that specialises on bringing conflict and arts together. She’s excited about giving arts more space in her life and is exploring her own creative skills especially around photography and writing.

Queenie Mason John

Queenie has worked for Leap since 2003 and is a specialist in conflict resolution and anger management. She is an award-winning playwright, author, and performance poet, a former co-editor of Feminist Arts News, and artistic director of London Mardi Gras. In 2005 she was Writer in Residence at Holloway prison, using creative writing as a tool to explore conflict in the women’s lives. Queenie’s first novel, ‘Borrowed Body’, won the 2006 MIND Book of the Year Award, and her sixth book, ‘Broken Voices’, documenting the lives of ex-untouchable women in India, was published in 2008. In 2000, Queenie won a Windrush Achievement Award for her contribution to the Black British community, and was recently awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Letters from the University of East London.

Rene Manradge

Rene has worked with _Leap _since 1991, and is now a Senior Trainer. His first project was as an apprentice, being trained in conflict resolution and practising his skills in an Islington youth club. This was the start of a powerful journey for Rene, as he had to confront and challenge many of his own preconceptions about himself and others. Since then, he has helped create, design and facilitate many of Leap’s courses and programmes. Rene is a Qualified Youth Worker, and has run projects in art and design as well as conflict resolution and team building. Rene is still inspired by seeing the “light bulb” or “Eureka” moment when participants realise that things can be different for them, and they can make powerful choices about their lives. When not working, Rene enjoys drawing and painting.

Rif Sharif

Rif has worked with Leap since 2005, and comes from a mediation background. She has delivered a range of schools work for the organisation, and has frequently worked as a co-trainer on peer mediation training.

Robin Coombs

Robin first joined Leap as a Peerlink Development Worker in the South West, and has recently begun to work for the organisation as a freelance trainer.

Shaun Barnett

Shaun was a participant on Leap’s Quarrel Shop programme, going on to work for the organisation as a Youth Animator. During his time in this role he delivered workshops to over 600 young people. Shaun often presents on Leap’s work, and is now a member of the freelance training team.

Steven Allen

Steven has been delivering conflict resolution training with Leap since 2004, after originally being a participant in 2000 on Leap’s Quarrel Shop programme. He has a passion for working creatively with young people who suffer social marginalisation, and has previously worked with the Children’s Rights Alliance for England, the Office of the Children’s Rights Commissioner for London, The Children’s Society, and as a detached youth worker in Kilburn. Steven is a member of an independent inspection team at Feltham Young Offender’s Institution. Outside of work, he spends his time campaigning on mental health issues, studies a part-time law degree, and pursues an academic interest in critical educational theory. He also enjoys hiking.

Upcoming events

3rd August 2010 → 18th August 2010

Quarrel Shop training → Read more

24th August 2010 → 24th August 2010

Working With Challenging Behaviour - London → Read more