Trustees

We have a troupe of trustees who volunteer behind the scenes to keep Mikron afloat, and make sure we’re fulfilling our charitable objectives

Jeff moved to Marsden in 1982 and soon became friends with Mike and Sarah (Mikron founders), and Mikron Theatre Company. He joined the Board in the 1990s and has been an active member since then.
Originally from London, his working background is in criminal justice, ending his career at Huddersfield University as a Senior Lecturer in Applied Criminology. However it is his practical skills which tend to be in demand at Mikron. He is regularly called upon by us as general fixer, maker, mender and fettler.
He has experience in other charitable organisations having been a founder member of Yorkshire and Humberside Circles of Support and Accountability, a specialist agency working with high risk sex offenders.
His own interests include mountains, building and playing in a country dance band.

Kate qualified and taught Drama in London before moving to Marsden to live opposite Mike Lucas, founder of Mikron Theatre Company, in 1981. During the following years Kate became a member of the Marsden Community Association, a member of the board of Management for Marsden Mechanics Institute, Mikron’s Office base , and a trustee of Marsden Jazz Festival. It was not until the 1990’s and the expansion of the National Waterways Tour to include the Autumn and Spring South Pennine tours that Kate was invited to join the Board of Mikron in order to ensure local representation. Mikron also ran a thriving Young People’s Theatre Group to which Kate contributed
Kate has spent most of her teaching career developing ways in which the Arts and Creativity can support Children with Special Educational Needs, This has involved both working for the local education authority as a Behaviour Consultant, writing project proposals to Children’s Fund Commissioning bodies, ensuring both service delivery, evaluation , financial rigour and accountability.

Dermot saw his first Mikron show in 2008 and joined the board of trustees in 2021.

In between that time he has worked as an actor, director, dramaturg, and lecturer – sometimes simultaneously – in various media and with numerous companies and individuals, and continues to do so.

He sees the arts as something that does, and should, belong to everyone, and is incredibly keen to ensure that Mikrons unique story, storytelling, and ethos is spread as far and as wide as possible, to an expanding and varied audience.

He serves on the board of other theatre companies and hopes that this, alongside his industry, educational, and personal connections and knowledge will allow him to play a small part in ensuring that Mikron survives and thrives long into the future.

Janet, who joined the board in June 2017, is a Scouser, who lives in Cropredy, Oxfordshire. She and her late husband have been supporters of Mikron for many years.

Janet is a qualified accountant and worked as a Finance Director in industry, banking and finance since the late 70s. She has also held non-exec and trustees roles for joint ventures, a London Housing Association and several charities.

In recent years she had scaled down her work commitments to become a full time carer for her husband, which she cites as both a joy and also her biggest learning experience. On the day she started thinking about doing more trustee work, the MIkron newsletter arrived advertising their search for new trustees …such is fate!
Janet is also the Treasurer for her Village Hall and for the Cropredy Film Society, and enjoys travelling (a lot!), gardening, walking, reading and photography.

Now retired (and wondering how there was ever time for work) Cath is delighted to join Mikron in 2021 as a Trustee.

Cath has followed Mikron since the mid-1980s when she first saw Mikron while on a work camp restoring the Basingstoke canal. Having met her husband through canal restoration they lived on their own boat for 6 years before ‘getting normal’ and settling in house in Daventry (having been born in Grimsby Cath is unsure how they ended up about as far from the sea as possible).

Although admitting to a period of missing Mikron while work and life got a bit busy Cath has been a more dedicated follower of Mikron for the last 15 years or so helping with things like moving the van (and actors), shopping and washing for the actors during the waterways tour. Now living near the heart of the inland waterways she is able to see (and help) Mikron twice during each waterways tour as they go down the Grand Union and then back via the Oxford canal. Cath also ventures further afield for her waterways fix often helping Tyseley up the Lapworth flight and down Tardebigge.

After university in London Cath joined the Civil Service eventually moving into project and programme management. She spent time as a reviewer of Government projects so is well versed in both good practice and also how not to do things.
Eventually she parted company with the Civil Service but remained involved in central government projects through her own business providing project support to a number of government projects in the education sector.

Cath’s other interests include walking – she usually has one of the long-distance paths on the go and finds walks to enjoy the scenery wherever she happens to be usually accompanied by at least one of her dogs. Cath also has retired greyhounds (as well as a ‘walking’ dog) which Cath describes as akin to having joined a cult – there are walking groups, social events and (like chocolates) you can never have just one.

Sam has been involved with Mikron in one way or another all of his life. The son of company founders Mike and Sarah he grew up with Mikron spending his summers on tour with the company on Tyseley and his winters in Marsden, the company’s headquarters since 1978.

After studying History at Bristol University, he started work in a television post production facility, before going freelance as a Post Production Supervisor in 2004. In this role he manages television drama post production and has worked on some high quality series such as Les Miserables. He has therefore maintained his interest and involvement in drama.

Sam became a trustee of Mikron in 2018 and is delighted to be involved with the company again and hopefully able to give something back. In his home town of Newark on Trent, where he lives with his wife, former Mikron actor Elizabeth Eves, he is an active member of the local RSPB group, helping to turn old gravel pits into a nature reserve and hopefully to create England’s largest inland reedbed. He is also heavily involved in his local CAMRA branch and the organising of the annual Newark Beer Festival, on the banks of the River Trent.

He co-owns an old working boat called ‘William’ built in 1931 by the same company Yarwood and Sons Ltd, that built Tyseley, and through this indulges his life-long interest in canals and boating.