The importance of collaboration

Collaboration is not only in our Trust’s name, it is also at the heart of how we work across the colleges.

That’s why it is so important that all staff, experienced and new to the Trust, embrace collaboration within both our immediate teams, and with subject colleagues across the different sites.

We want all staff to freely communicate with their Trust colleagues whenever possible, and in order to nurture this culture we have a half-termly cycle of subject collaboration meetings (SCMs) via Teams, alongside regular Trust planning days. This shared approach amongst the three sixth form colleges is further cemented by shared programmes of study, the same exam boards, and shared Trust assessments at key points in the year.

This strategy of collaboration is not only something we nurture at curriculum level, it is also a key part of our approach with HoSs, with pastoral teams, with safeguarding, careers, the Excellence Academy, and the senior management. All of these teams share the same commitment to half-termly collaboration meetings.

This Trust-wide approach serves a clear, single purpose: to provide that “outstanding, consistent student experience”. Where there are good resources, we want them shared; where there is excellence, we want it duplicated; where there are problems, we want everyone in the same subject area across the Trust to help solve those problems.

This collaboration will help us all to raise the quality of what we do, sharpening our practice and improving our outcomes. All of this is for the good of our students, ensuring that whichever site across the Trust they are based in, they will all have an exceptional educational experience.

This is how secondary schools in the Trust could work together to raise standards. However, this is only one possible approach. Although collaboration is at the heart of the Trust’s culture, the levels of strategic alignment versus levels of autonomy would need to be agreed by leaders. This would depend very much on the situation of the joining school/academy.