Collaborating with other trusts and schools

Explore how your multi-academy trust (MAT) can collaborate with other trusts and maintained schools. See what sorts of partnerships you can form, and find advice on how to set up these collaborations to make sure they’re worth your time.

Last reviewed on 15 January 2025
School types: AllSchool phases: AllRef: 44262
Contents
  1. Types of collaboration available
  2. How to set up collaborations

Types of collaboration available

With other trusts

You can set up a collaborative partnership. This will enable both you and another trust to run as separate organisations and retain your autonomy, while working together on specific areas under a formal collaborative agreement

There are no rules on how to organise this kind of partnership, but having a joint governing board committee could create multiple confusing layers of governance. Set up regular meetings instead between boards.

With maintained schools

However, this collaboration can’t involve a federated governing board or formal joint committees of the governing boards. This is because regulations that allow for the formation of types of federations between maintained schools don’t apply to academies (the Education Act 2002 and the School Governance (Collaboration)