Either, “There’s never been so much funding in our education service,” (Damian Hinds - Secretary of State for Education) or “Schools are beyond breaking point,” (John Harris - The Guardian). Our experience is that academy finances represent a significant challenge at this present time. The Trust is proactively managing the pressures we face and working closely with academy leaders and business managers. The emphasis is on creating schools that deliver high quality experiences and outcomes to our pupils and remain financially sustainable.
Chief Finance Officer, Jodie Younger explains, “Because we work across 7 local authority areas our Academies do have a different financial settlement and this means that the impact of rising costs varies from school to school. Sometimes, for good and historical reasons, schools have made choices about internal organisation that are proving less resilient to financial challenges than others. Where this is the the case the Trust is committed to helping schools to make necessary changes in ways that protect the quality of education that pupils receive.”
The Trust central services are provided at a much lower cost that those in Local Authority Schools (who routinely offer up 10% of their budget to the council and then have to pay for services as well). Being part of the Trust means that all schools get the high quality support services that they need (as opposed to those they can afford) on a fair basis. Because we are a charity and we don’t make a profit, we conservatively estimate that we are able to save our schools around £80K each year. This resource is invested in the provision that benefits our learners.