When Hannah Woodhouse (RSC for the South West) and I joined a CST masterclass on ‘joining, merging and growing’ Academy Trusts, the discussion with trust leaders on how the best trusts think about their strategies for development highlighted for me the great maturity of the sector. It was a great privilege for me to continue the discussion in a series of roundtables with trust leaders in my region.
Read moreAmongst the devastating impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic were several societal shifts that many people are likely interested in maintaining. For some families,...
Read moreThis has been a year like no other for children. The sacrifices they have made are enormous, like not seeing friends and family, having to learn remotely,...
Read moreIt was my pleasure to host a panel discussion at CST’s annual conference on the issue of regulation. We were joined by an esteemed group of panellists,...
Read moreThe brief to the Headteacher Standards Review Group was to develop Headteachers’ Standards for leaders of single schools. The review group, however,...
Read moreCatch-up. It’s the term on everyone’s lips. Gaps have widened. Commentators and think tanks alike put forward competing superlatives for the scale...
Read morePerhaps one of the worst outcomes of the pandemic will be if the hard-won gains made by schools in closing the attainment gap were to be reversed or even...
Read moreAs we near the end of this calendar year, I don’t suppose many of us will be too sad to bid 2020 farewell. It’s been a year with many challenges for...
Read moreIn his 2020 Association of School and College Leaders speech, the Secretary of State for Education set out a significant package of reforms to the teacher...
Read moreWhen the history of this period of education is written, one of the things that will certainly stand out is the response of our school system to an unparalleled...
Read moreGratitude has been hugely important this year. During lockdown, the Clap for Carers provided a much-needed positive moment every week. NHS rainbows dotted...
Read moreEmbark Federation is an Education Charitable Trust that serves 3,000 children and their families. Formed in January 2019, it now works with 9 schools,...
Read moreWe have been talking a lot recently, about the role(s) schools have been playing throughout the Covid-19 pandemic, as well as the role they could – and...
Read moreI was both pleased and a bit embarrassed to be recognised in the last edition of Trust as someone that had shown ethical leadership during this time of...
Read moreThe question of how we rebuild our economy, infrastructure and continue to work towards a fair and equitable society following the COVID-19 pandemic must...
Read moreWe often stretch metaphors at our peril. When telling the story of Oak National Academy, I think it’s worth the risk. Often in education we talk about...
Read moreOne of the most important challenges facing any school leader is deciding how best to create working conditions that maximise staff motivation to perform...
Read more"Good leaders change organisations; great leaders change people.” (Hoerr, 2005)
Read moreIn Robert MacFarlane’s ‘Mountain of the Minds’, he tells the story of cartography through the ages. MacFarlane describes how explorers were able...
Read moreIn the last edition of Trust, I wrote about school trusts as an insurgent mission. This is a bold mission, requiring spikiness and limitless horizons....
Read moreTo put this in some context: academisation is still relatively young. And in this short space of time, those who academised have had to formalise collaboration...
Read moreOne of my favourite phrases in leadership is when the CEO of an organisation brushes away the ‘executive’ part of their job title and replaces it with...
Read moreMATs are still new, complex and evolving in the education sector, which means leaders can often find themselves reacting to what is happening around them;...
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