Lydia is the Programme Manager for Born in Bradford’s Centre for Applied Education Research (BiB CAER) where her work broadly focuses on improving children’s educational outcomes. Her specific interests include inequalities, social mobility, academic attainment, SEND, and language and literacy development.
For the last four years, Lydia has led the Electronic Developmental Support Passport (EDSP) project. Co-produced with teachers and Educational Psychologists and already piloted across 42 Bradford schools, the EDSP provides a consistent method for teachers to record children’s developmental skills, identifies emerging learning needs, and offers targeted, evidence-based support tailored to each child. The tool is delivered alongside CPD on identifying and supporting the needs of Key Stage 1 children, champions communication between school and home, and is currently being rolled out across Bradford schools.
Over the course of 2024, Lydia coordinated efforts between the N8+ universities, Child of The North, and the Centre for Young Lives to produce monthly parliamentary reports which provided evidence-based recommendations outlining how the Government could and should put children and young people at the heart of their decision-making. As part of this initiative, she visited Parliament in 2025 to showcase this work.