Shirley has worked in various schools since qualifying as a teacher in 1987. She spent 13 years teaching Modern Languages in secondary schools in Sheffield and Derbyshire before switching to nursery teaching in the year 2001, where Shirley worked for a further 10 years. For the last 12 years, she has worked as a teaching assistant, mainly in year 6 and enjoy working with that age group. Shirley currently work as a year 6 SATs tutor across the four primary schools in the Trust.