To think executives earning £500,000 in a failing state secondary school system is utterly shameful?

[SharpOpalNewt]

How is this anything other than an absolute disgrace? This is public money and where all your taxes are going, while state secondary schools are an absolute shambles. The whole academy and free school system set up by Michael Gove is an absolute joke. They are royally taking the piss out of hard-working tax payers, parents, and the pupils who attend, many of whom are being completely failed by the current system.

England’s best-paid academy trust boss has been handed a £25,000 pay hike – taking his salary to over half a million pounds.

Harris Federation CEO Sir Dan Moynihan has become the first academy trust chief executive to cross the £500,000 threshold, latest accounts show.

He took home between £515,000 and £520,000 in 2023-24, up from a range of £485,000 to £490,000 the previous reporting year. This represents an increase of just over 5 per cent.

It is Moynihan’s second pay rise in a row. In 2022-23, his wages rose from between £455,000 to £460,000 to at least £485,000. This represented his first uplift in pay since 2018-19.

The trust – which has frequently been at the centre of controversy for its executive pay figures – has six other unnamed members of staff earning more than £190,000.

https://schoolsweek.co.uk/moynihan-becomes-first-500k-academy-ceo/

I thought schools were seriously strapped for cash and did not even have enough money to employ specialist subject teachers or rebuild dodgy crumbling concrete classrooms? Let alone the textbooks, materials and school trips which were all routinely provided at one time.

As a comparison, the head of Eton earns less. I imagine Harris academies are not particularly like Eton.

Labour ie Blair, introduced MATs to help deal with underperforming schools ie take them out of LEA control.
How do they "make money"? They are educational charities so by law are not for profit

How does it make money?

Many Trusts aren’t sponsored, they simply get the Government funding

The impact of such CEOs on the ability of head teachers to lead should not be forgotten.

We can't get away from the fact that running a school is also running a business. You still need to manage an operational team, which means dealing with multiple different teams of people, internally and externally, finances, performance management, staff coverage, with a background of forever changing mandates and restrictions from central government - i actually think the expectations that a headteacher is somehow experienced and talented enough to manage all of this on the business side, on top of being an experienced educator who stays on top of new research, laws, curriculum, learning styles AND has relationship enough with the students that they are still seen as a point of authority is unfortunately just unrealistic in today's world. I understand that the money may seem outlandish but an extra layer of management just seems like an absolute necessity - it just seems too varied a remit these days to expect one person to a. Be qualified/experienced enough and b. Actually get everything done that needs to.

I haven't read the whole thread but you are not wrong.

The comparison with the head of Eton is skewed. I would compare academy chain CEOs with the old Local Authority Head of Education/Children's Services or even the whole authority's CEO. I doubt any of them were on a comparable salary when nearly all schools were under LA control.

I have been banging on about this for years. Too many people at the top ends of these chains (even small chains) being paid inflated salaries. At the expense of the pupils. Every pound paid over the odds is a pound removed from a child.

As an ex teacher, I am a big supporter of decent pay for those who teach in and lead our schools. But there are many people in the system who have exploited the academy system for their own benefit. They should hang their heads in shame.

Very well said OP and well done for raising the issue 👏🏼 👏🏼

It’s vile, many CEO’s don’t earn that much. (Yes some do obviously before someone stupidly comments)

I can’t stand Harris academy methods. Kids are turned into scared little worker bees unable to forget a pen or wave to a friend in the corridor without being given isolation punishments. It’s not real life & you see the threads so often on here. People saying there kid was made to sit and stare at the wall in silence for 30 minutes all because they wore the wrong socks. We then wonder why we have so many school drops outs and kids incredibly anxious when what we offer is a military academy inspired by Korea.

I understand parents have little choice and behaviour can be bad at the alternative schools. Made worse because so many kids are excluded from the academies for not getting into line.

What I cannot stand is the teachers who choose to work in these places and allow the regime. I honestly think you must be a sadist to work there.

I hate the tories for allowing these academies to become so wide spread and it will be so hard to undo now.

Yes- and England as a country has mimicked their methods with its misrepresentation of national data in global measures. For example crowing about PIRLS results when in fact England moved up two places because Ireland and NI (which normally outrank them) weren't included in the latest measure. Everything is done with the aim of spin and and a 'teach to the test' ideology, not children's needs.

I think 'siphon off public money' is more accurate. As do private SEN schools, children's homes and, recently, even taxi services profiting from shipping children with SEN around the country on a daily basis.

Thank you, that's a great post.

Don't disagree with that but as you've pointed out, that isn't a MAT issue it is whole funding issue. The reason there are private SEN schools is cos the state ones are being closed down, see the current one that Labour are happily closing down.

The OP is conflating all of this onto being the fault of MATs. MATs are a result of over 25 years of government policy, started by Labour and expanded by Tories. This isn't a 1 party issue.

It is a MAT issue (crazy exec pay and too many layers of executive management) AND happening in the additional ways I listed.

I don't think OP is conflating- they've described one issue which I agree with. I don't want to derail by introducing others- so apologies if I've done that.

The thing is it's a public sector role , isn't it? The CEO of NHS England is on 300k. Just for comparison.

I'm never quite sure how these salaries get decided

I am generally not a fan of MATs but to blame them in the way the OP has is crazy. The CEOs of MATs are managing enormous budgets, if you paid peanuts you would get the associated talent levels.

What I cannot stand is the teachers who choose to work in these places and allow the regime. I honestly think you must be a sadist to work there.

I don't work in an academy chain and never have. Nor have I ever worked somewhere kids have to stare at a wall for 30 mins for any reason (though I do remember my little bro being given this punishment in primary school the late 90s for playfighting at lunch)..

That said, I think that it is too depressing to watch years and years of children who want to learn have their education completely destroyed by those who don't care about school. I can completely understand why it would feel worthwhile issuing detention for forgetting a pen if, after 5 years, those children left school to start A levels rather than failing their GCSEs.

@TankFlyBossW4lk there is more than one CEO in the NHS. Separate Trusts will have their own CEO or share one (which also happens in some MATs). In fact I think especially with smaller or medium sized MATs more sharing of the Exec level staff will happen as budgets get even tighter.

The last Tory Government wanted academy trusts to grow, to have small Trusts taken over by larger ones, mergers etc. Labour Government not pushing this.

They were answerable to the LA then

The problem is that there isn’t any oversight of MATs and salaries. They can top slice from school budgets and pay their executives what they want. The director of children’s services in my large county is on around £180k in comparison and that is a much tougher role with arguably more responsibilities. These CEO and other board members really need to be pegged to equivalent roles in local government and/or civil service as it’s tax payers money paying for them. No other government funded organisations would be allowed to pay their teams what they want with no oversight.

Just another note about high control environments. My very successful state grammar school in the late 90s / early 2000s had strict rules about everything - including what colour hair bobbles we were allowed to wear (black, green or tortoiseshell). The school still exists and is just as strict (my niece currently attends). These things are not the invention of MATs. The MATs are often copying behaviour models from very successful schools.

About 80% of Secondary schools are in a Trust, in some areas this percentage is higher so quite difficult for many teachers to opt out of teaching in an academy. Numbers are lower for Primary schools being in a Trust, but with birth rates dropping many primaries are struggling even more with budgets so may need to find a way to help that, and that might involve joining a Trust so can benefit from shared resources etc.

Trustees should benchmark salaries

Board of trustees oversees pay

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/setting-executive-salaries-guidance-for-academy-trusts/setting-executive-salaries-guidance-for-academy-trusts

I think academies can work when it's a one school academy but I hate the chains. One company with a monopoly on education in an area ?

What happened to parental choice ? Oh silly me, it's only for the ones who can afford to move house and even then it's likely that it's still an academy chain.

Chains should never have been allowed in education.

Totally disagree, SATs are the worst of all worlds!

Totally agree with you @SharpOpalNewt The Chief Education Officers we had in the LEAs earned nothing remotely like these 'CEO's. I was lucky enough to work under Professor Tim Brighouse who was an inspirational leader in Birmingham. We all managed perfectly well and had fantastic support and training from the LEA.
I think the academy system is a tragedy which has taken vast amounts of public money and lined the pockets of the 'leaders' This is before we even think about the amount of pressure they apply to teachers, other staff and pupils resulting in poor mental health. No wonder teachers are leaving in their droves and poor pupil attendance.