Guidance Notes

This guidance note provides a step-by-step approach for academy trusts to amend their articles. It covers the legislative issues affecting academy trusts derived by education, charity and company law and the oversight bodies with an interest in the regulation of academy trusts (as exempt charities and companies limited by guarantee).

This guidance note proposes model terms of reference for the audit and risk committee of an academy trust seeking to comply fully with the requirements of the Department for Education’s (DfE) and the Education and Skills Funding Agency’s (ESFA) guidance.

This guidance note proposes model terms of reference for the remuneration committee of an academy trust or multi-academy trust (MAT) seeking to comply with the requirements of the Department for Education’s (DfE) and the Education and Skills Funding Agency’s (ESFA) guidance and funding arrangements for academy trusts.

This guidance note is written for those MATs with established boards of trustees which delegate specific and significant functions to the senior leadership team and committees of the board (including local governing boards).

This guidance will help academy trust boards to build their own board assurance framework and, once in place, to assess whether it continues to be effective.

The Academies Financial Handbook (AFH) is one of the Department for Education’s key pieces of statutory guidance outlining good governance and financial management in academy trusts.

This guidance note will detail some of the most important roles that are required under the various reporting regimes, and their functions.

This guidance deals with the process of forming a charitable company limited by guarantee and should be read in conjunction with documents from the Department for Education relating to the establishment and running of an academy trust.

This guidance note is aimed at trustees (and directors) of multi-academy trusts (MAT) in England and can be adapted for any size of MAT to reflect good practice for each organisation’s needs.