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The NVRA Global Itinerary
We will have offerings from speakers & presenters around the world! More to be announced soon!
Non-Violent Resistance (NVR): conceptualising a New Authority to inform School culture by Jennie Giovanelli and Dr Tony Meehan
About the Presenters:
Jennie has been a teacher since 2002; her main subject is English. Since 2023, she has been headteacher of a large secondary school in Northampton, a school with ca. 150 staff and ca. 1500 pupils. Jennie has experienced NVR as a parent, and it was this first-hand experience that led her to consider how NVR could be applied in her school, exploring how a culture shift on the basis of NVR principles and toolkit, in particular, how NVR's concept of New Authority clarifies relational leadership, addressing increasing complexities among pupils.
Tony has 29 years' experience teaching and leading in secondary and special schools, including over eight years heading an inner London Pupil Referral Unit (PRU). Retired since 2017, Tony became interested in alternative strategies for handling challenging behaviour to reduce exclusions. Now a practitioner of NVR with Partnership Projects, he advocates this as an effective alternative to mainstream behaviour models, emphasising relationship-building and supporting adults in managing difficult situations with pupils. In 2024, Tony received a Doctorate of Professional Studies (Education) for research into the impact of school exclusion on parents and carers.
About the Offering:
This session will take the form of a discussion between Jennie Giovanelli, headteacher of a large secondary school in Northampton, and Tony Meehan, Partnership Projects, about our experiences of NVR as a parent (Jennie) and as a practitioner (Tony). We then move on to developing the idea of NVR/New Authority as a way of being in schools, as a powerful alternative to current approaches in schools, often based on control and compliance, one that is highly relational, but determinedly not a soft option. We explore Jennie’s experiences trying to develop these ideas within her school, and we explore how this conceptualisation of authority can inform a positive change in school culture. We look at how NVR shifts the paradigm within which all stakeholders involved in a school can develop a sense of authority/presence based on the structure afforded by NVR: mutual support, transparency, resistance, de-escalation, and actively and deliberately raising adult presence.