Meet Aileen Ponton, CEO of the SCQF Partnership

Aileen Ponton

What is your role within the SCQFP?

I am the Chief Executive Officer and was the first person appointed when the organisation was established in 2007.

What do you enjoy most about your role?

I enjoy the diversity of the work. We work with all sectors of education and training as well as with employers and CLD, so the conversations are always different and this provides us with opportunities to constantly think about how to engage with our different audiences. The second thing is to work with a great team of professional, dedicated and creative people who are as committed to supporting lifelong learning as I am.

Tell us a bit about your career to date

I trained as a teacher and qualified when vacancies were scarce, so moved instead into being a Training Officer with a Youth Unemployment Scheme for 6 years. After that I went to work for SCOTVEC and then SQA and was there for around 16 years, latterly responsible for SQA’s implementation of the SCQF. I then went out on secondment from there to be Head of Policy for Scotland for the Sector Skills Development Agency which established the network of Sector Skills Councils and then came to SCQF Partnership.

Tell us something interesting about yourself?

I can draw a pig using letters of the alphabet!