For the first time the North of England has its own Regional Schools Commissioner.

Based at the Department for Education office in Mowden Hall, on the edge of Darlington, Jan Renou’s role is to complete the reforms devised by former Education Secretary Michael Gove and carried on by his successor, Nicky Morgan.

The former Skipton Girls Grammar School executive head teacher’s job is to take operational decisions on behalf of the Education Secretary about academies, free schools and sponsors, marking a shifting of decision-making from Whitehall or town halls.

Certainly, since the Coalition Government came to power in 2010 the educational landscape in England has been transformed, with the number of academies increasing from 203 to the majority of English secondary schools and 2,000 primary academy schools.

Not surprisingly, the Middlesbrough-born Mrs Renou is a passionate believer in the current reforms and believes we are moving in the right direction but need to go further.

“Children only get once chance and it is our job in the education system to make sure that chance is the best it can be. My moral compass is that every child in the North of England gets to go to a good or outstanding school and that is what they deserve and that is what we are working for,” she says.

“I believe in where we are going, in system leadership, in the professionals taking on the responsibility for improving the sector. I also believe in working in your own region where you have the local knowledge of what is best for that area,” she adds.

One of the most important aspects of Mrs Renou’s role is to take action where an academy is faltering and approve the creation of new academies in a region which stretches from Northumberland to North Yorkshire.

Mrs Renou, who was brought up in Redcar, revealed that she has already started the process of identifying academies in the region which may need additional support.

Asked if she was now reviewing the progress of academies she replied: “Yes, that is what we are busy doing now. We are looking at the Key Stage 2 and Key Stage 4 results and, with my team, we are looking at what intervention might be needed. Parents would expect me to have the teeth to do something if schools are not performing.”

However, she stressed that it is not her job to intervene in schools that have been successful.

While there has been some criticism of the Gove reforms for taking schools away from local authority control Mrs Renou insists that many local authorities are doing “an excellent job” and it is not her intention to interfere with this.

“It is my job to work with LEAs for the benefit of all children,” she adds.

Mrs Renou says the key to the success of the reforms is to give more control to head teachers.

“What I like about it is handing over authority to the schools themselves and to our outstanding head teachers. They can now respond more quickly to their own community and the needs of children in their care, which can only be good.”

The new Schools Commissioner will be advised by a board of academy head teachers based in the North and elected by their peers.

As someone who has worked in education for 34 years, including 12 as a head teacher, she says she is used to going into schools and helping teachers and senior leadership teams to turn schools around.

“What I am doing now is taking that on to a bigger stage,” she adds.