Biography

Professor Sir William Taylor was born in 1930 in Bexleyheath, Kent. His start in education was not auspicious: he failed the 11 plus and subsequently spent four years at a technical school learning skills such as bricklaying, before an uncle helped him to successfully apply to Erith Grammar School for the last two years of his secondary education.

After National Service he attended The London School of Economics (LSE), graduating in 1952. He later qualified as a teacher at Westminster College and undertook postgraduate study and research at the University of London Institute of Education, where he obtained an Advanced Diploma in Education and a PhD. His early career was as a teacher in secondary modern and primary schools and then as Deputy Head of a secondary modern school in Kent. He went on to teaching posts in two Church Colleges of Education (St Luke’s, Exeter and Venerable Bede, Durham), and then as a lecturer in the Department of Education at Oxford University, prior to his appointment as Professor of Education and Director of the Institute of Education at Bristol University. He then spent ten years as Director of the University of London Institute of Education. 

 

Following his directorship of the IOE, Professor Taylor spent two years as Principal of the University of London. He then moved in 1985 to become Vice Chancellor of the University of Hull, taking retirement in 1991. He subsequently responded to invitations to serve as full-time interim Vice Chancellor of Huddersfield University (1994-5) and Thames Valley University (1998-9), and acted as Interim Head of the Winchester School of Art, 2004-5. He also became Visiting Professor at the universities of Southampton and Winchester.

 

He was awarded honorary doctorates by the universities of Aston, Bristol, Essex, Huddersfield, Hong Kong Institute of Education, Hull, Kent at Canterbury, Kingston, Leeds, Leicester, Loughborough, London, Open University, Southampton, Thames Valley, West of England, Ulster, Queens (Belfast), Plymouth and Glamorgan.

He was made CBE in 1982 and knighted in 1990.

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