A trust may have taken on another academy, moved more services into its central team or lost a key member of staff since its internal scrutiny programme was agreed. Yet the areas scheduled for review may have remained much the same.Reviewing the same areas again may be exactly right. The problem is continuing to review them without checking whether...

For academy trusts in England, from 1 October 2026, the time limit for most employment tribunal claims will increase to six months minus one day. A trust normally has 28 days to respond from the date the tribunal sends it the claim form. For a trust where HR responsibility is shared between schools, central teams and external advisers, the practica...

Internal Scrutiny is most useful when it does two things: confirms what is working and shows where a trust can improve. Aspire Academies Trust wanted a provider with the subject knowledge to do both. The Trust also wanted a straightforward process, with clear guidance before each review and no surprises on the day. Keystone was appointed to deliver...

September payroll rarely goes wrong because the payroll team cannot calculate pay. It usually goes wrong because one part of a staffing change reaches payroll and another part does not. The first payroll of the academic year can combine new appointments, internal transfers, pay decisions, FTE changes, term-time working patterns, allowances, family ...

Keeping Children Safe in Education 2026 comes into force on 1 September 2026. Until then, KCSIE 2025 remains the statutory guidance schools and colleges must follow. That does not mean the work should wait until September. The summer window is the opportunity to understand what has changed, decide who owns each action and make sure the right arrang...

Most schools will have reviewed or updated their allergy policy before September. The harder job is making sure it works across the whole school day.Staff need to recognise anaphylaxis, know where medication is kept and be confident about what to do. That must remain true at lunchtime, during clubs and when the usual member of staff is absent. Bene...

When Esteem Multi-Academy Trust was approached about acquiring an independent provider specialising in one-to-one tuition for young people at risk of exclusion, many of whom had Education, Health and Care Plans (EHCPs), the proposal appeared to fit well with the Trust's long-term ambitions.The organisation's specialist expertise offered t...

The Department for Education has published the Academy Trust Handbook 2026, which comes into effect on 1 October 2026. This year's changes cover inclusion, financial competence, digital standards, procurement, workforce decisions and public transparency. Some will affect decisions trusts are already making, including senior appointments, contract r...

GAG pooling is a spreadsheet conversation right up until the point it is not. Then it becomes a conversation about fairness, identity, trust, control and whether the phrase 'one trust' actually means anything when money starts moving away from the school gate. That is why it can make sensible people behave defensively. It is not because school lead...

Ensure a smooth transition and maintain accurate HMRC records Most payroll migrations go smoothly. The problems often don't appear until weeks later, when HMRC starts treating an employee as though they've started a completely new employment. One of the most common causes is a change in payroll number that hasn't been reported correctly. Because pa...

Most trust boards would say they take cyber security seriously. They will probably have policies in place, staff will have completed phishing training, and somebody will be responsible for software updates and backups. But could the trust continue operating safely after a serious cyber incident? That is a harder question to answer. The Government's...

A contract rolls over because everyone is busy. A trusted supplier gets another year because changing feels risky. A purchase sits below a threshold, so nobody thinks much process is needed. In schools and trusts, procurement problems are rarely caused by one major decision. More often, they come from small assumptions that build up over time. Peop...

As multi-academy trusts grow, payroll and HR processes often come under pressure very quickly. What works in a smaller trust can become much harder to manage once more schools, more staff and more local variation are added into the mix. In many cases, the issue is not that payroll stops running or HR stops functioning. The challenge is that the cen...

School leaders are entering a new era where reputation, retention, and long-term planning matter more than ever. For decades, many schools planned around growth. Rising pupil numbers supported expansion, increasing budgets, recruitment activity and long-term development planning. But across England, that environment is beginning to shift. Falling b...

With schools continuing to face rising costs, increasing SEND demand and growing pressure on budgets, many leaders are looking beyond traditional funding streams to support their pupils, staff and facilities. Grants can provide valuable financial support for everything from technology upgrades and wellbeing initiatives to SEND provision and major c...