Trusts concerned over financial pressures in education, survey finds

Trusts are increasingly concerned about financial pressures facing education, with financial sustainability overtaking improving the quality of education as top strategic priority, a survey has found.

It suggested that ensuring inclusive education, including for special educational needs, is the top classroom priority for nearly three-quarters of trusts, up from around half in 2023 – but this is being hampered by funding and resources and problems coordinating with external agencies.

The Confederation of School Trust’s (CST) National School Trust Survey includes responses from more than 400 trust chief executives.

Ernest Jenavs, co-founder of Edurio said: "Two major themes emerged from the analysis of this year’s survey. First, the evolution of financial pressures on trusts stands out. While trust CEOs feel their trusts have generally managed to deal with the immediate financial pressures, this has often come at the expense of depleting trust reserves

"The second key observation concerns the growing prominence of SEND issues. In recent years, SEND has surged to the forefront of CEOs' concerns, becoming the top priority within delivering high-quality education.

"Through it all, trust CEOs have demonstrated remarkable resilience and dedication to the sector. We are inspired by their constructive comments and examples of leading through the external challenges.”

The survey also found that trusts face a continuing struggle to recruit staff across their operations, with over 60 per cent reporting difficult recruiting teachers and teaching assistants, and over 40 per cent struggling to find SEND specialists and school support staff.

While the focus on "crumbly concrete” has faded, schools still face failing infrastructure, with two in five trusts saying they have building that are life expired or at "imminent risk of failure."

This year is the third year the survey has been run, with the full survey report delivering a unique picture of the state of the country’s schools and trusts.

CST chief executive Leora Cruddas CBE said: "Education will always be at the core of school trusts - it is fundamentally why we exist - but trust leadership is also about ensuring financial, physical, and strategic leadership so children have the space to flourish. From their outset, trusts have embraced new financial models to put more money to the frontline but recent years’ stretched public spending, and external economic pressures have made balancing the books all the more challenging.

"These results indicate that trust leaders increasingly see the power of a trust to bring schools together to address financial and educational challenges, with most anticipating taking on additional schools. This does not mean the future is only about large national trusts - the average trust size is still less than five schools - and we believe there is scope for a range of different sizes and structures.”