Graeme Young is the substantive Head Teacher of Our Lady of Good Aid Cathedral Primary School in Motherwell. Under his leadership, the school secured one of Scotland’s strongest inspection outcomes in October 2025, achieving ‘excellent’ gradings across three areas.

Graeme is currently seconded to North Lanarkshire’s central education team to build on and expand the distinct 7–11 pedagogy identified in Cathedral’s inspection report, first within a set of pilot schools and then across a broader group of schools.

Graeme’s passion for learning and teaching drives him to model innovative practice and cultivate a culture of continuous improvement, ensuring that high‑quality, sustainable approaches are embedded across classrooms. With more than three decades of experience, he brings a deep understanding of high‑impact pedagogy and a proven ability to translate research into meaningful, whole‑school change.

Central to Graeme's leadership is a sustained commitment to distributed leadership at every level. By empowering staff and nurturing a culture in which leadership is shared, supported and valued, Graeme ensures that collective capacity grows, innovation thrives, and every member of the school community plays a purposeful role in securing high‑quality outcomes for learners.

Alongside his role within North Lanarkshire Council, Graeme is also seconded two days a week to the Centre for Teaching Excellence as a Teacher Associate.

My research interests centre on primary school pedagogy, with a particular focus on developing a clearly articulated approach for children aged 7 to 11 that is grounded in educational theory. I am especially interested in how the organisation of learning and teaching in primary classrooms can create talk‑rich environments in which dialogue – between teachers and learners and among learners themselves – functions not merely as a means of communication but as a powerful tool for thinking and cognition.

President of the Catholic Head Teachers Association Primary Schools (CHAPS), 2022 - 2025