FEATURE
Advice – Atomix CEO Dr Nichole Munro encourages young people to work hard, embrace opportunities and do the right thing, even when nobody is watching.
COURAGE, TENACITY AND PASSION
The qualities that have shaped Dr Nichole’ s remarkable journey into inspirational leadership
Dr Nichole Munro’ s route into education was anything but typical. She left school with few qualifications, boarded a plane to Spain and spent her late teens running a motorbike shop and car rental business.
She moved between Spain and Germany, rode motorbikes and, she jokes,“ earned the scars to prove it”.
It was an unlikely beginning for someone who would one day become CEO of Atomix Educational Trust, which includes Prior Pursglove College, Stockton Sixth Form College, Errington Primary School, Guisborough Montessori and Bishopton PRU.
Returning to the UK as a young mum, Nichole wandered into her local college. By Monday she was enrolled – not for the GCSEs she expected, but for A-levels in Spanish and German after surprising her tutors by switching fluently between both languages.
That moment changed everything. Encouraged to speak to the University of Liverpool, she enrolled on a combined degree in Hispanic Studies and English. She completed it in three years rather than four, welcomed her second child that May and graduated the following month – a pace that has become her signature.
“ I have never let anything stop me,” she says.“ If you want something enough, you make it happen.”
Inspired by the teachers who backed her and while raising daughters Farah and Danisah, she completed a Certificate in
Education and later a PGCE, gravitating towards inner-city schools and exclusion units – the toughest areas in education.
She ran lunchtime reading groups for 15-year-old boys who were about to leave school unable to read or write. They came because they trusted her, as she’ d grown up on the same estate. That belief – that education must belong to everyone – still anchors her leadership.
Nichole then managed inclusion and work-based learning for a local authority, securing a £ 1m European funding bid for an innovative 14-19 programme; led English, maths and IT at Southport College; moved into teacher training; taught at Edge Hill University, and became an Ofsted inspector.
Then came a job offer in Saudi Arabia. Working across Saudi, Qatar, Kuwait, Dubai and Abu Dhabi, she led curriculum design, helped open some of the first women’ s colleges of excellence, mentored principals and helped establish one of Saudi’ s first all-girls football teams.
She introduced driving licence preparation for women two years before they were legally allowed to drive – with royal permission.
When Covid disrupted international work, she pivoted again: completing doctoral studies, supporting the Education and Training Foundation and returning to a senior role in Kuwait. Eventually her husband, whom she met in Saudi Arabia, encouraged her to return to the UK.
Then, in late 2023, came the quiet suggestion that a trust in the North-East needed turning around. Liverpool born and bred and living in the Midlands, she didn’ t know where Guisborough was, but two interviews later, she became interim CEO of Atomix, arriving on January 10, 2024.
“ What keeps me here is the people,” she says.“ We have to get it right for these kids. We must be like water – move over obstacles, under them or wear them down.”
Her leadership style is highaccountability and high-trust, rooted in empathy. Her ambitions for Atomix are bold: a trust built for the next century; international experiences for students; a“ golden hour” connecting schools worldwide; a robust SEND charter; meaningful civic duty for staff; a relentless belief that every child deserves a highquality education, and a new trust-wide brand and culture.
Away from work, she sings and plays guitar in her band, Acoustic Alchemy, and reads voraciously.
Now 49, what does she advise young people?“ Don’ t plan too tightly. Life won’ t follow it. Work hard. Say yes to opportunities. Do the right thing even when no one is watching.”
What’ s next?“ Getting this trust to outstanding – and taking my band to America. I want to play in Knoxville.”
With her record of making things happen, you wouldn’ t bet against her.
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