Academic Advisory Panel
The Academic Advisory Panel includes a group of world-leading experts in attendance research and school mental health. Their main role is to provide independent oversight of the project by reviewing progress at key points and offering advice on the methods we use. Drawing on their expertise, the panel helps ensure that the study is robust, ethical, and follows recognised good practice. Panel members also help us identify and address potential risks as they arise.
Prof Tamsin Ford
Dr Carolina Gonzálvez
Prof Trude Havik
Prof Tamsin Ford
Tamsin Ford’s research focuses on the effectiveness of interventions and the efficiency of services in relation to the mental health of children and young people, particularly at the health-education interface.
She completed her PhD at the Institute of Psychiatry, Kings College London and moved to Exeter Medical School in 2007 where she set up the Child Mental Health Research Group.
Arriving in Cambridge in October 2019, she became Head of the Department of Psychiatry in 2021 and is also an honorary consultant child and adolescent psychiatrist at Cambridge and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust.
Dr Carolina Gonzálvez
Dr. Carolina Gonzálvez is an Associate Professor at the University of Alicante (Spain). Her main line of research focuses on school attendance problems.
Her work includes the validation of instruments for assessing school absenteeism, the identification of risk profiles, and the design of pedagogical resources—such as books and training courses—to promote school attendance.
She is the Director of the SOS Attendance Observatory and the Valencian Institute for School Absenteeism, and a co-founding member of the International Network for School Attendance.
As an academic advisor, she contributes her expertise in school attendance research, assessment tools, and evidence-based interventions to support the project’s goals.
Prof Trude Havik
Trude Havik is a Professor at the University of Stavanger (Norway). Her primary research focus is on school attendance problems, with a particular emphasis on the role of schools and teachers’ work (which was her focus in her PhD topic in special education). School absenteeism is a complex issue. Her focus when teaching, lecturing, and working with schools and municipalities is that absenteeism is a systemic problem that we must solve together as a society.
Her research also focuses on classroom interactions, engagement, bullying, belonging, and friendship/social interaction. She is a part of the BACK-study, which is an RCT study in Norway (the intervention is Back2School). She is also a co-founding member of the International Network for School Attendance.