Our work
Advocate, connect, support: how we work towards a better education system for England's children
Shaping education policy and leading thinking
We are the national voice for school trusts. Our members educate more than four million children through the dedicated work of their 600,000 staff, with the majority of pupils in England attending academy schools.
We advocate for trusts by helping politicians, policy makers, and the wider public better understand their power to help children. We support trusts through practical advice, strategic guidance, and bespoke development support. We connect them with each other, and with expert thinking and research.
Our member trusts are responsible for more than three quarters of academy schools, with trusts ranging from single school trusts to national trusts with dozens of schools. We represent schools of all types, including special schools, alternative provision, specialist schools, and faith schools.
We have worked with successive administrations to put the needs of children, staff, and schools at the heart of policy making. This includes:
- Securing a commitment in the 2026 Schools White Paper for all schools to be part of a strong school trust
- Winning amendments to the Children's Wellbeing and Schools Act preserving flexibility for academy teachers’ pay; limiting powers to intervene in trusts; ensuring school quality is key to decisions on admission numbers; and a balanced approach to trust inspection
- Setting the agenda on SEND reform, through our paper on A good life: towards greater dignity for people with learning disability
- Working with Ofsted to amend their proposed new inspection arrangements based on feedback from member trusts
- Attendance at our Annual Conference by the Secretary of State for Education, and by senior civil servants on member calls and at our professional commmunity conferences
- Development of separate DfE guidance for governance of school trusts, recognising the fundamental difference from maintained school arrangements
- Representing school trusts on the government's Improving Education Together stakeholder group, and ensuring a trust voice in the creation of the School Support Staff Negotiating Body
- Responding on behalf of the sector to the Curriculum and Assessment Review, and consultations ranging from funding to food standards
We work with work with organisations across the education sector to promote equality, diversity, and inclusion. You can read more in our statement of action, published and updated annually.
Our five principles for advocacy
Our shared purpose is to advance education for public benefit. This means improving the life chances of every child through an excellent education. School trusts exist to advance education, improve schools, and serve children and communities. Our responsibility is to ensure that every decision we take, every policy we influence and every partnership we build is focused on improving outcomes, expanding opportunity, and enabling every school and every child to thrive.
We will advocate confidently for the contribution that effective trusts make to the education system: bringing together expertise, building capacity, strengthening leadership, sharing strong practice, and creating the conditions in which schools can improve and sustain excellence.
We believe the greatest progress in education comes through collaboration. We will work constructively with any government, regardless of political perspective, and with all partners who share our commitment to improving education.
We will build relationships based on trust and respect, while ensuring that the experience and expertise of trusts are heard and understood. We will engage positively in national debate, bringing evidence from our members and demonstrating how collaboration between schools can deliver better outcomes for children and communities.
We will champion evidence over assumption, and impact over ideology. Our advocacy will be grounded in the experiences of pupils, staff, families and communities across trusts.
We will demonstrate where trusts are making a difference: improving outcomes for disadvantaged pupils, developing teachers and leaders, strengthening school improvement, creating professional opportunities, and ensuring that successful practice is shared more widely. Where policy proposals risk limiting progress or creating unintended consequences, we will respond with evidence, insight, and constructive solutions.
We have a responsibility to act as stewards of the school system for the long term. Our role is not simply to represent the interests of our members, but to contribute to a stronger, more equitable and more effective schooling system for future generations.
We believe that stewardship requires openness. We will celebrate what works, but we will also be honest about what does not. We will support trusts to continue improving, learning, and adapting. We will promote high standards of governance, accountability, and leadership, recognising that public trust is earned through transparency, effectiveness, and a relentless focus on children.
Education is an act of hope and ambition. To quote Seamus Heaney: “Hope is not optimism, which expects things to turn out well, but something rooted in the conviction that there is good worth working for.” The education of our children is a good worth working for. Hope is the action we take towards that end.
We believe that every child deserves access to an excellent education, wherever they live and whatever their circumstances. We will champion the potential of trusts to help achieve that ambition: by bringing schools together, spreading excellence, supporting those facing the greatest challenges, and creating opportunities for children and young people to succeed.
Our commitment is to lead with optimism, courage, and integrity - to work with others, challenge constructively when necessary, and ensure that the contribution of trusts remains central to building a better future for education.
Advocate: the voice of school trusts
- An organisation that stands up for school trusts and the education sector
- A powerful confederation which advocates for the public benefit of education
- An effective voice in influencing policy and practice
- Promoting and sharing the benefits of schools coming together, based on the evidence
Connect: joining up trust leaders
- Connecting executive and governance leaders to ministers, regulators, and influential policy makers
- Creating networks of school trust leaders across key roles
- Connecting executive and governance leaders to what they need to know
- Leading policy formation with and on behalf of executive and governance leaders
Support: professional and trust development
- Guidance and policy support on the key issues for school trusts
- Regular email briefings and online engagement calls to explore topical issues
- Professional development designed uniquely for school trust executive and governance leaders, including training and mentoring
- Trust development services including external reviews of governance and bespoke support
