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The national sector body for school trusts has published new guidance on how trusts can best support and improve education.
The Building strong trusts guidance sets out the Confederation of School Trust’s position on seven areas, or domains, on which trusts should focus to provide maximum benefit for pupils, staff, and wider society.
The work is based on discussion and feedback from across the academy sector, and develops a CST discussion paper published in February 2022. It suggests that trusts should develop a strong organisational culture across seven areas:
Strategic governance: The trust anchors its strategy in the needs of its schools, the communities they serve and the wider educational system in line with its charitable objects.
Expert, ethical leadership: The accounting officer and executive team create a culture of expert, ethical leadership based on the Seven Principles of Public Life. They create a culture of one organisation, built around the trust’s purpose and values.
High quality, inclusive education: The trust creates a culture that is motivating and ambitious for all, especially disadvantaged children, and children with SEND, so that all pupils can achieve their potential.
School improvement at scale: A strong conception of quality and culture of continuous improvement is pervasive across all the schools in the group.
Workforce resilience and wellbeing: The trust creates a positive working culture for all staff that promotes collaboration, aspiration, and support.
Finance and operations: Everyone in the organisation recognises the importance of effective and efficient use of resources for the wider benefit of all pupils.
Public benefit and civic duty: Part of the culture of the trust is to work beyond its own organisation with other trust leaders and civic actors the wider common good.
The guidance is designed to provide a counterpoint to the Department for Education’s draft trust quality descriptions, which were published earlier this week.
Confederation of School Trusts Chief Executive Leora Cruddas CBE said: “The fundamental purposes of the two documents are different. The DfE’s intention is to set out (in draft form) definitions of quality to inform the regional directors’ commissioning work. Our work is about supporting the sector to build organisational strength and resilience.
“To best do that, we need to think hard about how we create school environments where all children flourish, ensuring both the optimal continuing development of their intellectual potential and their ability to live well as rounded human beings. But we also need environments where the adults flourish, so we need to care deeply about our workforce.
“We need to think about the flourishing of our schools working together in deep and purposeful collaboration as one entity, under a single governance structure, to improve and maintain high educational standards across a trust.
“And we believe that as trusts are a new form of civic structure, anchor institutions in their communities, we need to consider their duty to contribute to the wider common good.”
The guidance is designed to be developmental and indicative, so that trusts have room to give creative and innovative expression to what it means to be a strong trust in their own unique circumstances.
