Pilates Teachers Association Board Members

Our management and board have a wide range of skillls to ensure that the members and the public can have confidence that we have created a structure  where highly skilled professionals have control over the activities of the association. The board will be responsible for all aspects of  membership; publications; fees ; member services;  daily operations; accounting and finance; legal  contracts; staffing; management of association; liaison with other professional bodies and Government departments; resources; ethics, grievances, appeals and complaints from members of the Public. Each member of the Management team and Board of Directors is either a Pilates Teacher or a student of the Pilates Method.

Lesley McPherson - Director and Founder

Lesley has taken a particular interest in the development of standards in the fitness industry - specifically Pilates in the UK and Europe for many years. Her first fitness qualification was Exercise to music in 1989 when the current "advanced" anatomy knowledge was the basics and was an early member of REPs. She was introduced to Pilates via a 2-day matwork qualification in the UK in the late 1990s and subsequently retrained with a comprehensive school - Peak Pilates from 2003 -2009.  She completed the Master's programme for Comprehensive Pilates Teachers with The Pilates Center of Boulder in 2013. Workshops and continuing education include first Generation Teachers such as  Mary Bowen, Lolita San Miguel and Jay Grimes,  2nd generation Teachers including Kathryn Ross-Nash, Blossom Leilani Crawford, Lori Coleman-Brown and Junghee Won.  Non -Pilates education includes workshops with Professor Stewart McGill and UK exercise industry courses in Medical referral, L4 back pain, Assessor and Internal Verifier. Lesley remains actively involved in the development of Teacher Trainers and has mapped Pilates training programmes to the UK level 3 and the Level 4 standards in Europe.
 
Lesley's ultimate goal is to lead our body of members in gaining a Chartered status for the emerging occupation , Comprehensive Pilates Teacher. 

Dr Faith Gardner - Chairperson of the Board of Directors

MBBS,MSc,FFSEM,MLCOM,Dip MSk Med, Dip SEM

Dr Gardner uses the Pilates method to compliment her fitness regime and regularly refers Patients to the method. She has  been training and working in the specialities of Musculo-skeletal Medicine and Sport and Exercise Medicine for 20years, full time since 2001 when she qualified as an Osteopath and completed an MSc in Musculo-skeletal Medicine. She is a Fellow of the Faculty of Sport and Exercise Medicine in Ireland and in the UK.Dr Gardner has worked in private practice in Kilmarnock and Glasgow since 2001 and is also the assessing doctor for the Scottish Performing Arts Clinic based in Glasgow supported by the British Association of Performing Arts Medicine.

Professor Moira Lewitt

MBChB, PhD, MMedEd, SFHEA, FRACP, FRCP

Moira Lewitt is a Professor at the University of the West of Scotland, having worked previously she in Australia as a Consultant Physician in Endocrinology, and then as a Senior Researcher and Associate Professor at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm. Her research interests extend from basic to clinical science, with a particular focus on the prevention of obesity and diabetes. A Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, she also has an interest in curriculum design and interprofessional learning, and has developed a model for the education of Classical Pilates teachers. She has a passion for the art of flamenco, is an experienced flamenco dancer, and uses dance movements to complement Pilates-based exercises.

Megan MacGregor

LLB Hons Dip LP

With over 25 years experience of corporate, commercial and governance law, Megan has also been an enthusiastic student of yoga and Pilates for more than 17 years and has been a full time teacher of both forms of mindful movement for the last 7 years. Prior to teaching, Megan worked full time as an IP/IT and commercial lawyer for a number of large corporate firms in Sydney, Australia and the UK.

Megan qualified as a Yoga teacher and a Pilates instructor (Mat/Reformer and Studio Pilates) through Tiaki Pilates and Yoga Wellington, New Zealand in 2011 and has completed post-qualification training in pre-natal/post-natal Pilates at Elixir in Sydney Australia plus Yoga for Kids and Families with Rainbow Kids Yoga.

She has also studied with Ana Forrest, Darren Rhodes, Sadie Nardini, Simon Park, Sarah Owens and Don Peers and most recently with BodyMindLife’s Noelle Connolly. In 2016 she completed her comprehensive Rehabilitation/Studio Pilates Certification with Polestar Pilates Australia studying directly under Polestar Educator and mentor Joanne Bezzina who was the Next Pilates Anytime Teacher 2017. Megan has continued to learn from internationally respected Pilates teachers including Courtney Miller, Olga Tamara, Blossom Leilani Crawford, Kathryn Ross-Nash and Amy Havens.

Megan is currently working towards Introductory Level Iyengar Yoga Teacher Training under Senior Level 3 teacher Helen Graham in Glasgow and is studying Complementary Therapies full time at City of Glasgow College.

Don McPherson

Don's background in fitness and adult education is extensive. A full contact martial arts practitioner for over 20 years he credits the Pilates method for keeping arthritic hips mobile.  In his capacity as training programme manager for a multinational insurance company he wrote and delivered many training courses and workshops, managed and assessed training teams and delivered sales results. During his comprehensive education he worked with teachers educated by the late Romana Kryzanowska and also with Kelly McKinnon of Corpus studios in Brussels.

Laura Turner

BA Hons Accounting & Finance, 14 years ACMA

Laura is a testament to the healing benefits of Classical Pilates and readily admits that Pilates completely revolutionised her life.

Laura suffered for several years with chronic back pain. After taking regular lessons in Classical Pilates her back pain reduced so dramatically, she was inspired to take her Pilates to the next level. From early 2012, she practised with increased focus and was accepted to enter The Pilates Centre (TPC) Teacher Training Programme - a fully comprehensive, world-renowned training. After 950 hours of internship, Laura completed the Advanced Teacher Training Program and was further inspired by a trip to TPC, Boulder, Colorado where she studied intensively with some of the best teachers in the world.

During 2015 Laura continued her studies with Cara Reeser, a second-generation Pilates Educator and a student of first generation teacher Kathleen Stanford-Grant, to complete the “Heritage Training” in Switzerland.

She worked as a full-time Pilates Teacher in Dubai for over 3 years before relocating back to Scotland in June 2016 to set up her own studio www.turnpilates.com