Commissioning high-quality trusts: summary of guidance

Get to grips with the DfE’s guidance on commissioning high-quality trusts. Understand how the DfE measures the quality of trusts, and what it means for your trust.

Last reviewed on 12 July 2023
School types: AllSchool phases: AllRef: 42805
Contents
  1. What is this guidance for?
  2. 5 new descriptions to measure trust quality
  3. The DfE will use the descriptions to consider the best trust for each school
  4. Use the trust quality descriptions to guide your governance
  5. Your trust won't be judged against these descriptions

This article is based on the Department for Education's (DfE) guidance on commissioning high-quality trusts.

What is this guidance for?

This guidance explains how the DfE:

  • Judges the quality of academy trusts
  • Uses that information to decide which schools to recommend to which trusts

5 new descriptions to measure trust quality

These ‘descriptions of trust quality’, or pillars, are broken into 3 groups, based on what they tell the DfE about what a trust can deliver.

Pillar 1: High-quality and inclusive educationThe core of what the DfE expects and the starting point for considering a trust’s effectiveness
Pillar 2: School improvementDemonstrates the capacity the trust has to offer
Pillars 3, 4 and 5: Workforce, finance and operations, and governance and leadershipDemonstrate the resilience and sustainability of the trust’s operating model

Read the descriptions of trust quality in more detail

High-quality and inclusive education Theme Description Culture Creates a culture