Nancy Lhoest-Squicciarini
Special Interest Group Chair

Head of Community Relations, International School of Luxembourg | WomenEdBeLux NetWork Leader

Presently, Nancy is Head of Community Relations at the International School of Luxembourg and the facilitator for the ISL Virtual Learning Loft, which provides professional learning opportunities for international educators. She is a trainer for the Principals’ Training Center and the ECIS Middle Leaders Certificate Programme with a true passion for supporting the development of teacher leadership.  Nancy is one of the network leaders for @WomenEdBeLux, a global grassroots movement that connects aspiring and existing women leaders in education. Her previous roles include being the Assistant Principal responsible for Teaching and Learning, Chair of ECIS Curriculum and Assessment Committee, and a Middle School teacher for 24 years.  Her approach to developing a positive school climate is building and supporting strong relationships between all the school’s stakeholders.

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I’m Kim, a technology consultant and educator with nearly two decades of experience living and working in diverse settings across Asia, North America, Europe, and Africa. On the micro level, I thrive at empowering teachers and other professionals to authentically embed new and emerging technologies in their classrooms and workplaces. I create a dynamic, inquiry-based, learner-focused environment for everyone with whom I collaborate. On the macro level, I guide schools, school districts, and businesses in implementing innovative, tech-rich, and community-inclusive learning programs within their organizations, in order to meet their varied goals. I pride myself in effective cross-cultural communication, which is evidenced in my business functioning smoothly across 6 time zones, with employees in four different countries.

In educational settings, I excel at supporting schools in their journey towards 1:1 (student:laptop) learning. While I am from the U.S., I currently live in Bangkok with my husband Alex, who is also an educator. In my spare time, I enjoy geeking out about my lifelong learning journey on my blog, Always Learning, or training for and competing in powerlifting which I detail on my other blog, Learning to Lift. Other interests of mine include plant-based cooking, yoga, Zen meditation, photography, reading (especially science fiction), traveling, and leading an urban hiking meetup. I volunteer as the Secretary General of the Thai Powerlifting Federation, and am passionate about supporting women in their quest to reach their strength goals. Other fun facts about me are that I collect Persian carpets, view eating as a top priority, and have a goal to visit 50 countries before turning 50 (having already met my goal of visiting 30 countries before 30).

I passionately believe in the power of education to make the world a better place for adults and young people alike.

I have been a teacher and head teacher in some of the world’s leading schools before specialising in learning and development for school improvement. This journey has enabled me to develop and lead one of the UK’s largest education professional learning and development services before founding the International Leadership Academy (ILA), The Hague. This physical and metaphorical centre is learning and development home for international schools across Europe as well as the learning for school improvement arm of the British School in the Netherlands, the largest British international school in Europe with over 800 staff. I am particularly proud of developing the flagship International Professional Qualifications (iNPQs) and we work with around 2500 school staff every year.

Alongside this work I am also a global board member for the TES Institute and a strategic lead for WomenEd globally, with responsibility for Europe and Asia. I am a Founding Fellow of the Chartered College of Teaching and Fellow of RSA. I am author of the recently published ‘International Perspectives’ chapter of the Amazon number one bestseller ‘10% Braver: Inspiring Women to Lead Education’ book published by Sage (2019) and have also written for education publications such as TES, Schools Week, International Schools Magazine and Independent Schools Magazine. As a visible school leader, I advocate for the profession and speak around the world on the theme of leadership development and the global school workforce.

These are exciting times in the global village of education and I look forward to connecting, leading and developing learning, realising the potential we have to improve the world and securing bright futures for us all.

I worked in US and UK university admissions and recruitment before transitioning into college admissions counselling and teaching. This has taken me to international schools in the US, Costa Rica and Spain (I am able to work in Spanish). As a consultant, I have worked for The British Council, King’s College London, The University of Sydney, the French Lycée in New York, Aloha College, and BridgeU before joining my current startup, Xperienceships.

With experience of teaching, counseling, and innovative leadership over a 15-year career, I am most proud of building a global network of university admissions and guidance counselling colleagues for collaboration. I am especially interested in themes of Ikigai, social and purpose-driven careers, diversity and 21st century careers. I am a regional co-lead for the Spain chapter of the WomenEd network, which aims to increase women leaders in education, and I host The PilotEd Podcast, an exploration of disruptive and innovative educational models around the globe.

A visionary, courageous, adaptive, and inclusive leader who believes in the power of holistic education to engender the agency, competency, connectedness, creativity, and authentic learning that is necessary for students to positively influence a peaceful and sustainable future.