Supervisory Board profiles

Dr Helen Wright is a highly experienced and well-regarded educator who has been Head of high profile schools in the UK and Australia for over 13 years. She was awarded the prestigious Tatler School Awards’ Best Head of an Independent School for 2010-11. Helen has fulfilled a number of national UK roles, including as Vice-Chair of the Independent Schools Council and President of the Girls’ Schools Association; she is also a published author and writes and speaks regularly at significant national and international events. She is a trained inspector with the UK Independent Schools Inspectorate and currently sits on a number of Education Boards, including the University of Oxford Alumni Board, the Dalton Foundation in Hong Kong, and the English Speaking Union (Scotland). She has chaired a research group at the World Leading Schools’ Association. She is extremely well-networked and well-respected in the world of UK and international education and is committed to making a positive impact through education at local, national and global levels. Helen studied Modern and Medieval Languages at the University of Oxford, has a Masters in Applied Linguistics from the University of Leicester and a doctorate in Education from the University of Exeter.

Helen joined the Supervisory Board in July 2018 and her first term will end in July 2022. She is Chair of the Education, Welfare and HR Committee of the Supervisory Board and since January 2020 has been Chair of the Supervisory Board.

Himanshu Shah joined the Supervisory Board in June 2014. He was re-elected for a second term which will end in July 2022. He is currently an Executive Director/Associate Partner with Ernst & Young.

A chartered accountant by professional qualification, he has spent more than 20 years in senior compensation and benefits roles in companies like Vopak NV,NXP Semiconductors, ABN AMRO Bank and Aon Hewitt Consulting in the Netherlands and in Asia. Himanshu brings a wealth of experience in financial management, compensation and benefits, performance management strategy, HR systems and governance to the Board as well as detailed insight into the needs/issues of international organisations dealing with a multicultural workforce.

Himanshu and his wife, who has a PhD in Psychology, are of Indian origin and live in Ouderkerk. Their two sons have been at The British School since Nursery and are both in the Senior School.

Annette Roodhart joined the Supervisory Board in June 2014. Annette was re-elected for a second term which will end in July 2022. Annette and her husband are both local and their son was in The British School for eight years until moving to a boarding school in the UK. Annette is a partner in Salomons & Partners, where she is responsible for global executive search and HR consulting. She is a former Global HR Director for Santa Fe Reynolds Tobacco. Previously she was responsible for group HR with Selecta, a private equity owned market leader in vending solutions, and has held local and international HR positions with Maersk and Bacardi.

Annette brings experience in HR, internal communications and structuring organisation development to the Board. She graduated from the Erasmus University/Rotterdam School of Management.

Jonathan Gimblett is a British citizen and qualified as a lawyer in the UK in 1994. Since 2005 he has served as a Senior Vice President and General Counsel in Europe for Prologis. Prologis is the world’s largest owner and developer of industrial real estate. In this position he manages a team of 20 lawyers and paralegals and oversees all legal aspects of Prologis’ business across 14 countries in Europe.

Prior to joining Prologis, Jonathan worked for Linklaters, a UK international law firm, specialising in international corporate real estate transactions working in London, Moscow and Warsaw.

Jonathan holds a degree in Economics & Law from the University of Wales. He is a Solicitor of the Supreme Court of Judicature of England & Wales and a member of the Association of Corporate Counsel and Global Leaders in Law.

Jonathan has two children at The British School of Amsterdam and has been resident in the Netherlands since 2005. His eldest daughter was at the school for 12 years. Jonathan joined the Supervisory Board in 2015 and second four year term ends in October 2023.

John McLaren joined the Supervisory Board in September 2011. In December 2016, John moved to Saudi Arabia and so stepped down from the Board. John has now returned to the UK and in January 2020 he re-joined the Board as an Independent Board Member. John works in global communications and in the past has worked for three years for DSM as the Vice President Corporate Communications , 11 years as corporate director of global communications for AkzoNobel in Amsterdam. After leaving the Netherlands, he worked for just under three years as communications counsel for a management consulting firm to the banking and services sector, and then the last three years has been doing PR for energy suppliers in the Middle East. John currently works as a global communications strategist and counsel.

John went to St. Edmund’s, Canterbury and graduated in law from the London School of Economics. He is also a governor of Danes Hill in England and former Chairman of the Haberdashers’ Knights Academy. John is the Chairman of the Communications and Development Committee of the Supervisory Board.

His second four-year term comes to an end in December 2023.

Ilya Meshcheryakov joined the Supervisory Board in March 2018.

Ilya was formerly the Group Business Controller at Royal DSM NV, a Dutch global science-based multinational active in the fields of health, nutrition and materials. Prior to this position, Ilya has worked for AkzoNobel leading the Finance function in the Region covering Eastern, Central and Southern Europe, North and South Africa and Turkey. Ilya has worked in senior finance positions for more than 20 years and has experience with supervisory and management boards, experience in leading teams and managing change across functions, geographies and cultures.

Ilya has master's degrees in Finance and Control from Maastricht University, Business Administration from TSM Business School and Economics from Voronezh State University. Both of Ilya's daughters attended The British School.

Professor Subramaniam has been appointed to serve on the Supervisory Board as a Parent Member effective as from February 2020. Vinod is the Rector Magnificus (vice chancellor) of Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and has been since 2015. Vinod studied electrical engineering at Cornell University. He received his PhD in 1996 from the University of Michigan in applied physics. Later he was affiliated with the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry in Göttingen and in 2002 he became a senior researcher with AstraZeneca in the UK. In 2004 he was appointed professor at the University of Twente. He was also scientific director of MIRA, the University of Twente’s Institute for Biomedical Technology and Technical Medicine. Professor Subramaniam was appointed Director of the FOM Institute AMOLF in Amsterdam in September 2013. In September 2020,  Vinod was appointed by the Minister for Education, Culture and Science to be the Chairman of the National Advisory Committee on Diversity and Inclusion. 

Vinod has a daughter in the Senior School and is a member of the Education Committee. His term of office will end in January 2024.