A guide to expanding MATs for HR and Finance professionals
In this guide we will look at the key challenges facing Multi Academy Trusts (MATs), which have grown significantly in number since the start of academisation in 2010. With the well publicised pressures of squeezed budgets and increasing demands on HR and finance teams, MATs looking to expand may encounter barriers to their growth.
Drawing on expert opinion from academics, COOs and our own education team, we will look at key issues for MATs, including the importance of strategy, how you can get new academies in your trust up to speed, and advise on how technology can help ease some of the burden on HR and finance teams, providing freedom for them to do more.
Contents
- Why aim for further growth?
- The rise of Multi Academy Trusts
- Considerations when investing in software
- Identifying a school for conversion
- Why strategy is the backbone of success
- Implementing technology in your growing MAT
- Getting new academies up to speed with your MAT
- What makes for a successful MAT?
- Going for growth: Key considerations
- Overcoming Trust growing pains: A statistical analysis
- What does the future hold for MATs
- Final thoughts
Why aim for further growth?
MATs are the Department for Education’s (DfE) structure of choice. In the Governance Handbook, the DfE states that governance structures spanning more than one school create the opportunity for better teaching.
The MAT model involves a number of academies working in collaboration, with a single trust at the head responsible for the governance of all the academies within the academy chain. This model has a number of benefits, such as the ability for schools to maintain their governing body while being able to grow and support a wider network of schools.
With the sweet spot being 12-20 academies to make the most of shared resources, for many MATs, continued growth means more benefit.
Other advantages include:
• More effective governance
• A clear identity and focus
• Economies of scale creating savings
• Widespread enrichment opportunities for pupils, such as through the provision of a larger range of breakfast and after school clubs
• Shared best practice
• Reduced costs per school through centralised services
• The ability to focus funds where they are most needed
• Shared resources, including staff
• Increased staff retention by increasing opportunities
Spotlight on: The rise of Multi Academy Trusts
It is easy to see why so many academies are keen to join forces as part of a trust. With the responsibility for managing their own budgets and business functions, the ability to share resources and expertise can be a huge draw. According to the latest government figures¹ there are 6,106 Academies in England, including 1,668 Single Academies and 4,438 in Multi-Academy Trusts (MATs). These numbers are likely to continue to increase with more schools planning to join trusts in the near future.
Whether or not academy status drives up pupil attainment is still a matter for debate. But perhaps it is no coincidence that the five top performing secondary schools in England are all academies and, of those, four belong to MATs.²
That is not to say that MAT growth is always straightforward. One of the biggest challenges for trusts is the different levels of competencies in the academies they are onboarding.
Another challenge, of course, is funding and many schools have already seen real-term budget cuts. Teacher pay rises of 3.5%, agreed in 2018, could put additional stress on stretched-budgets on top of the
increased cost of essential supplies, like facilities maintenance and energy bills.
I am confident that MAT growth will continue in the coming years, unless it is halted by government intervention. Whatever happens, every school – whether an academy or maintained – will have to manage their resources even more effectively.
Being part of a MAT brings more buying power and economies of scale. Instead of having a finance and HR department in each academy, it surely makes sense to streamline resources into a central business support team, with a single platform that authorised users across different sites can sign into.
The Department for Education (DfE) recently signaled its determination to standardise financial management in academies with the Better Financial Reporting programme. Enabling academies to automatically submit financial information could result in enormous time-saving benefits, while the DfE has better quality data to analyse.
Automating admin processes to save time and reduce user-error is at the heart of what Access does, so we’re fully supportive of the DfE programme.³ Although it is still early days, one thing is clear: as the number and size of MATs increases, technology is key to maximising budgets and delivering positive pupil outcomes, today and in the future.
Jane Gibson
Education Industry Expert - The Access Group
Key considerations: What to think about when investing in software
- Does the product meet the unique needs of MATs?
- Is it quick to implement and easy to use, enabling you to extract value from it as soon as possible?
- Does it integrate with other systems, so you can automatically generate reports without logging onto another platform?
The Access Group has grown rapidly over recent years, so we are aware of the challenges this brings – for MATs which have to take on failing schools, this can be a more difficult task.
Managing growth – Growing MATs need a solid plan for integration. Getting a school on board quickly without harming the MAT, communicate expectations to staff. From there, they can get the right systems in place – what do they need and how do you implement it?
The Access Group survey found that:
Budget cuts will be the biggest challenge
98% of HR, finance and business support staff said that budget cuts would be the biggest challenge facing the sector over the next two years
Decision-makers in MATs are expecting to grow
70% of decision-maker within MATs expected their trust to grow in the next 12 months
1 - 5 academies is the optimum size
52% of Education HR and Finance Leaders said that between one and five academies is the optimum size for a MAT
MATs: Identifying a school for conversion
Due diligence is the most important factor when identifying a school that could help your trust to grow. A greater emphasis is needed on the business support aspect, rather than to focus solely on what is happening in classrooms, which can be an easier fix.
When selecting a school, it is essential to work out what is needed but also what else is in place that could be an asset to the trust. Even schools in special measures have some great people and strategies, whether that’s a new approach to wellbeing, for example, or an outstanding head of science.
A trust that fails to grow is at serious risk of failing to implement new changes to improve. Following detailed due diligence, if the benefits of taking the school on outweigh the short term losses of getting the rest of the project up to speed, even a school in special measures could be a huge stimulus for your trust.
Adrian Ball
Chief Operating Officer - Inspiration Trust
Checklist: Essential financial tasks during the conversion process
If you are adopting a school which previously was not an academy into your MAT, then there are a number of essential financial tasks which you must ensure take place during the conversion process.
- Submit the EFA budget forecast return within six weeks of receiving our final funding letter
- Open a new bank account, notifying the EFA
- Appoint academy accountants/auditors
- Complete a financial management and governance self-assessment, using the online form, within four months of opening
- Register as an academy with HMRC and obtain a new PAYE coding reference for payroll
- Register your academy with Companies House as soon as the EFA has approved your memorandum and articles of
association, to enable you to submit annual financial statements - Ensure all members of staff, governors and trust members have current DBS checks
- Register under the data protection act with the information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) and appoint a data protection officer
Expert opinion: Why strategy is the backbone of success
Dr Jacqueline Baxter is Associate Professor in Public Policy and Management at the Open University, a Senior Fellow at the Higher Education Academy, a member of the Council of BELMAS (The British Educational Leadership, Management and Administration Society), and Editor in Chief of the Sage Journal, Management in Education. Here, she explains some of the challenges MATs currently face – and what they can do to avoid them as they expand.
While there are clearly some excellent MATs across the country, their sheer size – and the financial freedom they are afforded – mean they also face major challenges. The most obvious issues are the lack of accountability, since they do not have to report to the local authority, and the fact that growth could span different geographical and council areas, combining rural and city schools, with very different needs and challenges.
It seems that success also comes at a price, with top-performers often under pressure to take on failing schools. Every time a MAT takes on another academy, it risks rocking the boat and could compromise standards across the trust. If a school is in special measures, it will often have a failing board of governors and budget shortfalls, which are only likely to compound existing funding challenges for the MAT overall. It is no wonder MATs could be reluctant to take on new schools when they may risk jeopardising the overall reputation of the organisation.
There are some clear examples of MATs taking a measured approach to growth, and are well aware of the potential problems associated with it, these MATs have strategic plans that factor in finance and growth in terms of their medium and long term aspirations. Yet this isn’t the case across the board.
Worryingly, I have spoken to MAT leaders who have no idea why they want to expand or who chose to do so simply to avoid being ‘eaten up’ by a bigger trust. Our research has found that, while there are a number of factors driving growth, including shared values and mitigating risk, resources and business viability play a significant role.⁴
All this underlines the importance of having a clear plan for the MAT’s future, and the steps needed to get there. In my experience, religious trusts are often good at this because they are used to working in federations and approaching issues as a cohesive group.
The fact that trusts receive large sums of public money means they have a responsibility to develop a robust strategy, and approach growth in the same manner as any other responsible business, although not all are successful at this. As mentioned previously, this requires a measured approach that encompasses educational and financial outcomes. There is nothing wrong with expansion, as long as MATs do so in line with the resources they have and as long as they are clear about how the expansion fits with their aspirations and overall strategy.
One concern among leaders of smaller MATs is that they will be forced to take on under-performing schools that need significant support from the local authority. Although this looks like an ‘easy’ way to raise standards, it simply pushes the problem to another body and could lead to further disruption across the system.
If, however, there is a strong strategic plan and rationale, then even smaller MATs have the power to determine their own future and make a strong case for why a school should or shouldn’t join. Within the MATs system there are some good examples of best practice, but there are still numerous issues that need to be resolved.
Top tips to implement technology in your growing MAT
Purchase
Choose true cloud solutions. For a growing MAT, cloud software is easy to implement and extend to new academies with no software to install and access provided via a standard browser. Do insist on true cloud software as opposed to hosted on premise software that often comes with additional complexities
Share your growth plans with suppliers during the selection process. This may influence how the software is implemented and save you time and money down the line as your MAT grows.
Is your software designed for Education? Whilst accounting, HR and budgeting solutions may share core elements with other industries, the UK education market has many specific requirements and statutory returns, make sure your supplier supports these and commits to supporting future changes to the statutory requirements.
Talk to reference sites that are the same size as you and those who are the size you aim to be. That way you can have some assurance that your chosen supplier can support your growth plan.
Will your software support growth? Both technically and commercially. Are there any server or configuration limits with larger implementations? Some suppliers offer site licences as opposed to specific user licences. Site licences allow you greater flexibility as your MAT grows. It is important that you understand how your chosen supplier’s commercials work as your MAT grows - you don’t want to be faced with any unexpected costs half way into your contract.
Look for flexible support offerings. After you have added several more academies you will become more expert in the systems and may require less support. Does your supplier offer support options to meet your needs and level of experience?
Implementation
Scalable and repeatable processes will ensure you maintain quality throughout the project.
Have a standard implementation across your MAT that you apply to every new academy. This will simplify implementation and as you repeat the process you should gain competency and speed.
Allocate a project owner/manager to be the “go-to” person and drive the project forward.
Communication is crucial in any software implementation. Have a project kick off meeting to set expectations of stakeholders and share timelines & plans. Ensure you continue to communicate throughout the project. At the end of the project learn from your successes and your mistakes. Review what went well and what didn’t for the next project and adjust your process accordingly.
You don’t have to migrate all data. Moving to a new system can often be an opportunity to cleanse data e.g. suppliers in a finance system, or old pay scale data. Note there are statutory requirements on the storage of certain data items but this should not stop you reviewing to identify which data should go forward to your new system.
For mission critical software like payroll, parallel runs are essential.
Have a risk plan for each implementation identify key risks, their impact and importantly any risk mitigation.
Preparation and Processes. Fail to prepare and prepare to fail. Preparation is key alongside repeatable processes. As you grow you will be carrying out the same tasks as new academies join. Scalable and repeatable processes will ensure you maintain quality throughout the project. Be sure to regularly review your processes and adapt as you grow.
Get off on the right foot. Consider how to support your team on the first day of implementation. e.g. floor walkers on site for the first day. Have people on hand to nip problems in the bud and assist those who need it. Twilight sessions for staff to review issues and problems. Schools are time precious organisations try to make the best of that time and ensure problems are not left to fester.
ALL ABOARD!
Advice to get new academies up to speed with your MAT
As chief operating officer of Inspiration Trust, Adrian Ball has experienced the many aspects of incorporating schools into a growing trust. With 13 academies now part of the Trust, Adrian explains some key lessons when bringing a new academy up to speed.
For schools looking to become an academy and join a Multi-Academy Trust (MAT), the competitive advantages can be huge. The greatest immediate benefits include the access to a bigger scope of school improvement strategies, a range of academic expertise, greater buying power and financial security which comes from being part of a group.
At the Inspiration Trust we stress the importance of these benefits being shared both ways. If the on-boarding process is completed effectively, then a trust can gain from adding another member to a like-minded group, as well as adding a fresh infusion of concepts and enthusiasm.
The biggest challenge during the on-boarding process is the lack of solid information. When schools are brought into a trust following their fall into an Ofsted category or special measures, the quality of record keeping is often poor. Even when a school is ranked as ‘good’ or better, the difference in management information systems can present difficulties in identifying common fields of information.
It is important to understand that schools in special measures will be in that position for a reason and much of this stems from a lack of paperwork, particularly around staffing, governance and finance.
At the Inspiration Trust, we are the first to admit that we made some mistakes during the on-boarding process for the first few schools we brought into the trust. Ultimately, this is because we made decisions with our hearts, rather than our heads.
Initially we put too much focus on being the saviours of the school
When you’re looking at a school that is in trouble, it is easy to get invested in how you can turn the school around early on and focus solely on the education provision. It’s certainly true that initially we put too much focus on being the saviours of the school, rather than focusing on the practicalities and costs involved in making the necessary changes. In one example, we missed a major drop in the local demographics and a huge fall in pupil numbers which took a few years to recover and increased costs significantly.
Since then, we have focused on creating an objective report on the school as a business for consideration by trustees, which combines both financial and operational due diligence reports with an overview of what is required to improve educational outcomes. As part of this, it is important to get a projection on future pupil numbers and the initial capital investment that will be required, as well as scoping out any transferring liabilities.
You always expect to see initial losses, but it is important to have a date when the school starts to contribute to the trust. Within five years, by which point the school will have had two OFSTED cycles to get out of special measures and up to ‘good’ or ‘outstanding’ standard, you should be seeing a return on the trusts investment.
For growing trusts, it is important that the focus is on clarity of communication on the vision and values, which will enable you to get your culture and processes in place most effectively. MATs offer a great vehicle to dramatically improve schools, but it is essential that due diligence processes are effective to ensure the long-term viability of the wider trust.
Adrian Ball
Chief Operating Officer - Inspiration Trust
Challenges during the onboarding process
Staffing
Despite the fact that nearly a third of publicly-funded schools in England are now academies, there is still some fear
and resentment towards academies and academisation. This means that, during the on-boarding process, staffing can become a problem if communication isn’t there.
Fears can be exaggerated if the trust doesn’t communicate its aims to staff clearly. It is also essential for MATs that they can gain the support of unions. Although the conversations with union reps can be difficult, if you can get the unions on board, it can go a long way to allaying concerns of their members. Once a MAT has proven itself to be effective at bringing a new school or academy on board, the unions will be happy to work with them and develop a strong relationship.
Governance
Securing the cooperation of the board of governors at a school can have a huge impact on the ease of the on-boarding process and how quickly the school can be brought up to speed. In most trusts, governors will have reduced influence, as the articles of association and schemes of delegation put greater legal responsibility in the hands of the trust board. This can be a challenging realisation if it is only discovered following academisation.
No one will complain about receiving too much information, so be clear and up front from the start of the process and don’t give an impression of autonomy to governors if it is unlikely to exist. It is much easier to have these difficult conversations at the start of the process.
Finance
The ability to scale a MATs financial system is a huge benefit to the on-boarding process, particularly if a trust is ambitious and looking to take on more than one school at the same time.
The key considerations from a financial point of view are around basics, such as whether the budget has been approved, as well as if inflation, demographic changes and cost of living increases, have been factored into financial plans.
What makes for a successful MAT?
Successful MATs come in different shapes and sizes; however, they always have an accountability framework which ensures everyone understands what happens when essential staff members are not performing to required standards.
The most successful MATs plan for the future, and that includes filling vacancies when a leading team member leaves the establishment. There should be a clear succession plan for essential posts within the MAT; this includes ensuring there are strong talent pools within your organisation.
There also has to be delegated frameworks for governance at trust and LGB level. These should establish the authority levels for authorisation, and clearly state where the Secretary of State for Education’s consent must be sought. This ensures that roles and responsibilities are clearly defined and understood – preventing any duties being neglected and ensuring accountability.
The productivity challenge
The Access Group found that 71 per cent of decision makers with finance, HR and business functions in the sector find productivity in the workplace considerably or extremely challenging.
Two-thirds said that currently they cannot directly access the information they need from other departments.
HR, finance and business decision makers surveyed thought that being able to use collaborative technology and software would result in their organisation being an average of 13 per cent more productive.
Financial management policies and procedures must be robust and followed to the letter. A strong internal auditing process must be in place and well qualified experts should be leading the way. Auditors should be well-versed in DfE requirements and adhere to the National Audit Office’s (NAO) expectations.
Policy changes should be effectively communicated and efficiently implemented with risk management strategies in place and ensuring you know what changes are on the horizon.
A system of school-to-school support is often employed that is focused on needs and enables steady expansion without compromising education. And, of course, the education and safety of the children should be at the forefront of every decision.
Going for growth: Key considerations for MATs
Steve Howell is CFO of Red Kite Learning Trust. He knows all about the challenges of growing a multi-academy trust (MAT). Following a successful career in the private sector where he worked for the likes of Unilever, Coca-Cola Enterprises and various other large organisations. In 2009 he joined Harrogate Grammar School as business manager.
The school became a founding academy of the Red Kite Learning Trust MAT and Steve’s role grew from there. Now he has fiscal responsibility for 13 academies and the thriving Red Kite Teaching School Alliance, with a £50m turnover, 8000 students and pupils, and 1200 staff. He has a unique perspective on the challenges that come with growing a small MAT and taking it to the next level.
An estimated 80% of MATs have five or fewer schools within their trust and while the objective of growth for growth’s sake is not recommended; larger trusts are able to offer greater stability and wider benefits to their member academies, often out of the reach of smaller MATs.
Growth is therefore an objective for many MATs, including Red Kite Learning Trust, as we aim to increase efficiency and continually improve overall educational performance. But what should be considered during the critical early phase of growth?
Dedicate resource
Smaller trusts face significant challenges around how to fuel growth without access to additional funding. Leaders in an emerging MAT can end up taking on the significant task of growing the MAT alongside the rigorous demands of their day job. For obvious reasons, this can be problematic.
Identifying the right moment to bring in new colleagues and additional resources to help manage growth can be tricky. At Red Kite Learning Trust this moment came when we got to six schools. Up until this point we were managing with shared resources from within the core schools where people and skills were being offered on a largely voluntary basis. This could only continue for so long though and we reached a point where we needed to expand our dedicated business support team.
There was a real step-change when the trust grew by another seven academies to make thirteen in total. Six new maintained schools and one academy joined the trust, almost overnight, leading to an increase in the need for an expanded central team. An increase in financial contributions to the group at the same time made this possible and we took on a director of operations and developed additional senior leadership and operational capacity in Finance, HR and Network.
Skip forward to today and Red Kite Learning Trust has a part-time purchasing manager, a full-time estates manager and extra resource for governance and administration. Over time we’ve been able to carefully build a central team with wide-ranging benefits for member academies and the group as a whole.
Clarity for joining schools
Even in the very early days though, when we were a MAT of just three academies, we started out with a centralised view of the world. This may not be the case for all MATs, but I believe it is important to have a clearly defined strategy from the beginning.
It is important to have clarity about the MAT’s culture and organisational structure early on. If a MAT begins life with a delegated or widely distributed authority structure it can be very difficult to change things further down the line.
While it can take time to reach maturity, to establish processes and procedures and to get systems working effectively across a MAT – having a clear vision is critical, especially for schools considering joining.
Software, standardisation and collaboration
It may seem like a small detail to some, but joining up systems across the MAT is vitally important. And while simple things, like having everyone on the same email platform may seem straightforward, it can be more complex than expected.
We’re investing in a common network infrastructure to ensure the highest level of collaboration across the organisation. This has the benefit of increasing knowledgesharing amongst teaching professionals, improving the efficiency of the production of curriculum teaching resources, and making the excellence of our “leading light” schools more accessible for other member academies undergoing change and looking to tackle specific challenges, improving literacy for example. Technology is at the heart of developing this collaboration and enabling excellence.
Back-office systems shouldn’t be overlooked either. The ability to work together in the most efficient way possible by shifting to the cloud and managing everything from risk and compliance, to payroll, training and HR is crucial. Standardisation also brings enormous gains in efficiency across the group.
Primary and secondary
We also learned early on that a mix of primary and secondary schools brings significant advantages of sharing professional best practice across both phases of education. Lots of MATs have a single secondary with multiple primary feeder schools around them. For us, this doesn’t allow for the same potential collaboration and CPD benefits for staff or enable the same excellent level of shared expertise. This is vitally important because improving teaching performance, and the development and retention of skilled teachers is inextricably linked with success.
Recruitment and retention
That’s why we invest in recruitment through our strong central HR team, but as our MAT grows, we’re able to improve our retention rate too to keep people interested with varied roles across the organisation.
At Red Kite Learning Trust we’ve endeavoured to focus on the five “Cs”: capacity, change, compliance, culture and coherence. With limited resource it’s difficult to prioritise which areas get investment and at which juncture, but we believe a clearly defined vision, the right MAT structure and the latest technology to enable collaboration are fundamental to our growing success.
Overcoming Trust growing pains: A statistical analysis
Nicola West Jones is head of market research at The Key, a trusted provider of knowledge and know-how to education leaders. In her role, Nicola has run focus groups and surveys of decision-makers in multi-academy trusts. Their recent report, in partnership with Forum Strategy, “Trust expansion: overcoming growing pains”, explores trust leaders’ motivations, priorities and plans for growth.
Here, Nicola discusses some of the key findings and offers an insight into the challenges and benefits associated with trusts taking on more schools.
Plans for growth
We asked leaders about their trust's plans for expansion and found that 54% are in the process of trying to grow.
28% would grow "if the right schools came along"
12% would like to grow "in the future, but we're not ready"
The reasons trusts aren’t looking to grow are far from controversial. For many, the key consideration for trusts looking to grow is centred around carrying out due diligence, not just on finances and performance data, but also ensuring that any school joining their trust is a good fit culturally, sharing a similar ethos and vision for education.
Geographical challenges
While most trusts see growth as a necessity for financial viability, many also have concerns around expansion. These worries centred on the location of any new schools, but also the trust’s ability to continue to support existing schools after further expansion, and concerns over compliance and risk when integrating a school into the trust.
53% of respondents fear “spreading our area of operation out too far geographically”
51% are worried about “the negative effect on existing schools in the trust in terms of our ability to support them”
25% are concerned about “compliance and reputational risk arising during the integration phase”
These findings show the importance of ‘localism’ to schools and trusts, with the main concern about growth being sites spread too far geographically. Concerns about the negative impact on new and existing schools also highlights strong ethical leadership from trust leaders – they are really focused on school improvement.
Trust leaders priorities
With the increase of academies and trusts across the country, growth to achieve economies of scale has become seen as the top priority for trust leaders. However, our findings show a number of other key considerations for decision makers.
We asked trust leaders to pick the top strategic priorities (up to 3) for their trust over the coming academic year:
53% said that “improving our budget situation and/or raising income” was a priority
51% will be focused on “consolidating the curriculum offer across the trust”
The third most common priority is “adding new schools to the trust and/or merging with another trust” (39%), closely followed by “centralising services” (38%)
It’s not surprising to see a focus on financial concerns. Ofsted recently found that headteachers within trusts were worried about finances following budget reductions and operating in a challenging financial climate. Interestingly these priorities differ across small (up to five schools), medium (6-10 schools), large (11-20 schools), and mega (20+ schools) MATs.
Looking ahead: What does the future hold for MATs
Dr Jacqueline Baxter
“Any return to full local authority control is unlikely to happen, whatever happens politically, we have come too far for that, and the costs would be prohibitive. MATs that have good strong governance are more likely to have a successful future, but unless their overarching issues with governance and accountability are addressed, we will continue to see more of the high profile failures that appear all too often in the media.
Ofsted is only permitted to inspect individual schools. Even if they were permitted to inspect trust boards, it is unlikely that they have the capacity within their already overstretched organisation. This is why we need an independent body to inspect high level MAT boards and ensure that they are providing good standards and high levels of financial and organisational probity.”
Jane Gibson
“According to the latest DfE figures, academies incurred a deficit of more than £6billion⁵ – and I have no doubts that the pressure to make savings will intensify further in the coming years.
A central support team, connected by a shared platform, allows MATs to reduce the number of duplicated tasks and time-consuming admin, while providing the quality data school leaders need to drive decision-making.”
Adrian Ball
“Whatever happens politically, academy trusts will still be around and I think we are too far along the academisation process for any significant backtracks. The next phase for MATs will be greater collaboration and merges between trusts, with more growing to the sweet spot of between 12-20 academies to make the most of shared resources.
Smaller trusts of two or three academies will soon become unsustainable and more of these trusts will have to join larger trusts to succeed.”
Final thoughts
As this guide has shown, being part of a growing MAT could put single academies and maintained schools on a stronger financial footing that supports pupil attainment.
Speaking regularly to school leaders, and understanding the challenges they face, I believe the MAT model offers real benefits.
An investigation by Schools Week, reports that supersized academies are now taking on high-performing schools ‘en masse’ with some now moving into the ‘sweet spot’ for economies of scale (around 12-20).⁶ Any bigger than that and there is a danger that they lose their agility, so become little different to a large local authority.
I’d echo Dr Baxter’s views that every MAT, no matter what its size, should have a strategy for growth. Given how precarious funding can be, trusts will have to scrutinise how every penny is spent in order to operate successfully as a business.
every MAT, no matter what its size, should have a strategy for growth
It goes without saying that pupil outcomes are the priority for every education professional, and MATs can provide a structure to push best practice across a number of schools. From curriculum planning to back office tasks, they need the right tools to consolidate data, uncover what works well and then instill these processes across the trust.
As Adrian Ball points out, technology is an essential part of this journey. Like any business scaling up, ensuring easy access to accurate and up-to-date information is critical to implementing a strategy for growth of a trust.
It goes without saying that collaborative platforms are key to harnessing this data and making strategic decisions. Schools often have the data but lack insights – and this problem is amplified in large trusts. A successful MAT knows what is happening across the school and continually makes improvements.
At The Access Group, we understand the challenges MATs face, particularly those who take on failing schools. Never has it been more important to have a solid plan in place for integration, so schools join the MAT with minimum disruption. From there, it is a question of getting the right system in place to help every academy excel.
Paul Grubb
Education Industry Expert - The Access Group
Find out how Access Education can benefit your growing trust
1 Source: SFR_Template_NonNatStats (publishing.service.gov.uk)
3 Source: Better financial reporting for academy trusts - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
4 Source: Baxter, J and Floyd , A (2019) Under review (BERJ)
5 Source: Academy Schools Sector in England – Consolidated ARA 2017 (publishing.service.gov.uk)
6 Source: Investigation: Supersized academy trusts are on the rise (schoolsweek.co.uk)