Meet the Staff
Julie Bayford
Julie's career began in childcare before becoming involved in youth work and completing her degree in Informal Education in 2010.
Julie started working for Phoenix in 2011 as Youth Participation Leader. She soon learnt lots about deafness and began learning BSL soon after, although the young people still help her learn all the time! She immensely enjoys helping the young people develop their skills, grow in confidence and become independent young adults. After stepping up as Acting CEO during a time of transition for the charity, Julie has now accepted the role permanently and looks forward to the exciting challenges ahead.
Laura Bone
Laura started learning BSL level 1 as a hobby in her spare time and loved it so much she continued on to level 2 & 3. She has previously worked as a communication support worker at Bedford college and has worked with us at Phoenix since 2015. She enjoys working with the Deaf community and the young people as well as currently teaching BSL here at Phoenix.
Mark Hinton
Mark has worked with Children and Young people now for over 15 years in England, America
and Australia and with all age groups from many different backgrounds and with different
experiences. He is passionate about participation and thinks it's important to be able
to empower young people to share their views and ideas.
Mark started learning BSL in 2017 when he was with Hertfordshire County Council
and worked his way up to level 2 then more recently picked it up again when working
for the NDCS in 2019.
Beryl Whyatt
Beryl joined Phoenix as a volunteer in 2013. Previously she had worked for the BBC as Assistant to the Executive Editor of BBC London. She took early retirement from there to administer a national dance charity and for the past 7 years has been Finance Officer at Phoenix. Following the early retirement of the Administrator, she has agreed to formally join the staff and add those duties to her role.
Volunteers
Christine Dillnutt
Christine has been with Phoenix as a volunteer since 2014. She is the secretary to the Trustee Board and is usually in the office on Tuesday mornings. Christine is a hearing aid user and also a volunteer for Herts Hearing Advisory Service.
Yana Zayed
Yana has spent many years working with self-advocates from across the globe on disability equality and non-discrimination. After returning to the UK in 2020, with a meagre handful of random signs from different countries, she finally embarked on her goal of learning BSL and is currently navigating her way through Level 2. She volunteers with the Phoenix Group whenever she can spare the time, in support and admiration of the valuable work it does.
Playworkers
Emma Keane
