Academy Trust CEO Salary

[EdithGrantham]

I've recently found out that my DDs prospective primary school is in consultation to be taken over by a multi-academy trust rather than being run by the LA, I'm a teacher myself so have my own thoughts on academies in general but one thing I'm not clear on is where the money comes from for paying the CEOs and higher-ups?

www.gov.uk/types-of-school/academies#:~:text=Academies%20receive%20funding%20directly%20from,Academies%20are%20inspected%20by%20Ofsted.

Thanks, I had found that but what I'm not clear on is where does this extra money for CEOs etc come from compared to LA schools? Is it that academies are on a different funding structure so get more money or do they take from what would usually be spent on things like teachers, TAs and resources for the children?

Yes academies receive the money directly from the ESFA and then distribute it to the schools, they can centralise back office like payroll, hr, facilities and make savings on purchasing and shared teaching, ie a lead teacher in PE across the trust.
In return the schools pay an agreed amount (2-5%) back to the academy trust that pays the salaries of the shared services.

Thanks, is there good evidence that this leads to more money being spent on pupils or is it more or less the same?

this paper is a few years old but might be helpful Understanding the Middle Tier - Comparative Costs of Academy and LA-maintained School Systems - Sara Bubb Associates 16 July 2019.pdf

"In conclusion, the big picture illuminated by our research is how expensive running two middle tier systems is, with so many resources being channelled into senior leadership posts. We also found that an unintended consequence of school autonomy, system fragmentation, and funding restrictions has been the worsening of provision for vulnerable pupils. The poor service for pupils with special needs was noted consistently by headteachers in the case studies. The high performing international school systems, which prioritise equity for all pupils as well as sustaining high performance, provide a sharp contrast: they have a strong educator led middle tier which ensures that resources are used to support the improvement of all students in all schools. "

In a non Academy school you pay a proportion of your ESFA funding back to the LA for those services. You just don't get much say in the quality or relevance of what they offer

They're a scandal waiting to happen

This is my understanding too, but I think there is a bit of evidence that teachers on academies on average earn 1300 less than thier maintained school counter parts.

The neu (which I appreciate isn't neutral) thinks there are more leadership roles and more big ceo pay.

I did once divide the ceo of Harris academy salary by the number of pupils in the academy and it was about £11 per pupil.

But that said LA services aren't free and are increasingly dire.

Thanks all so it's not clear cut basically and I shouldn't go to the consultation meeting demanding to know how the CEO can sleep at night knowing he's taking money away from the children 😆

You can ask what thier 'top slice' is.

It varies according to trust but ranges from 3 to 11 percent in our area. Ask how it compares to the LA

Then ask what support/services they get for that money. Hopefully the bigger the slice the more you are getting.

Whether there are plans to increase it in the future?

How the school will access SCA or conditions funding for capital projects. Who decides what they get.

That's great, thank you!

@EdithGrantham the CEO of the trust may earn similar to a senior leader at a local authority. Their salary reflects the fact that they are leading several schools. The CEO of the trust that runs our school more than earns his pay (and earns less than other people I know with much less stressful senior jobs in the private sector).

Local authorities generally take a bigger cut of maintained school budgets than academy trusts take of academy budgets, because they are generally less efficient - that is one argument for academies. Another argument is that academy trusts can choose whether they provide services themselves or buy them in. They usually buy some services from the LA, and maybe some from neighbouring LA's or other educational service providers.

It's silly to make a fuss about the principle of academisation - academies are now widespread and here to stay. Instead, focus on whether this trust is the right one for your school.

A typical LA education director salary:

You can compare schools' spending and income here
Schools Financial Benchmarking - GOV.UK

Schools make at least a yearly comparison.

Some MATs take a larger slice for lower graded schools as they may need more support and less from the schools needing no support or supporting others.

Some MATS allow schools to operate with little change while others want a more uniformed approach.

You can also make money from selling your staff skills to others in the MAT, usually rather than them buying into SLAs. If you have skilled practitioners, you can charge for training for other schools.

Maintained schools buy into SLAs which used to be mainly with their own LA but now many search around for best value and compare what they are getting and if provides value for money. If not look around.

Anyone earning over 100K needs to be on your website.

the CEO of the trust may earn similar to a senior leader at a local authority

Not in my LA and no comparison in role, responsibility and accountability.

Director of Children’s Services (DSC), responsible for 170,000 school age children, plus children’s social care, statutory duties around safeguarding, attendance, inclusion, school place planning, early years, AP’s etc. We have nearly 400 schools witnout considering inclusion teams, social workers, ed.psychs, attendance officers, medical education service, music service, outdoor learning service.
Accountable to elected council members through public, scrutinised documentstion and meetings. Accountable to the DfE.

I ‘googled’. Average salary of a DCS is £116,000 per year.

As a comparison local academy trust. Trust has 11 schools. CEO salary is £250,000 per year. Accountable directly to the DfE and to a small board of trustees, elected by the board.

Just one example, but I could share more.

Parents should be questioning where money comes from to pay that huge amount. It is hardly a silly fuss!

@wunderfull Absolutely no comparison in those roles. And then you add in ‘Chief Operating Officers’ and directors of anything that moves, and you’re looking at senior executive salary bills for a trust of maybe 8 or 9 schools in excess of what an equivalent LA team would have cost to cover 2 or 3 hundred schools.

LAs have been under-funded for years and had functions removed and so services are definitely not where they should be. But still, there is often ‘buyer’s remorse’ for a headteacher who has joined a MAT: the top slicing of revenue, poor central support and lack of autonomy make the grass of the LA look very green indeed.

@EmLaJae @partystress senior salaries for publicly funded roles are published so that they can be called out in cases where they are excessive. There have been cases where excessive LA directors' pay has been called out, and there have been cases where excessive MAT CEO pay has been called out. That does not mean that all of these people have excessive pay. The OP (@EdithGrantham ) hasn't named her school or her MAT or her LA so none of us know whether her MAT CEO pay is excessive. She and you are just expressing prejudice against the academy system that is rooted in your politics - an attitude that is for dinosaurs and ostriches. Pragmatism is the way forward. The OP needs to be objective and consider if this the right move for this particular school based on all of the local evidence, not on her pre-conceptions of the academy system.

No preconceived ideas here. I work in the education system and experience the flaws of the academy system daily. CEO pay is the biggest waste, especially in ‘mates MATs’ where recruitment to roles and pay has even less scrutiny.

A massive impact of Conservative politics is that LA’s cannot open new schools, only a trust can. We have buildings in planning, conversions of unused school buildings nearly ready, but no trust to open the planned special schools. The academyntrust system an absolute blocker of much needed places.

In the system, we are pragmatic, because there is no choice. As a trustee of a MAT I can scrutinise, just as I do with governing boards of maintained schools.

It is rather gualing for parents to receive a begging letter, every December, asking them to donate a book to school, when the CEO earns £210,000.

@wunderfull is right that focusing on whether it's the right trust is the main aim. Something like 78% of secondary pupils are in academies.

The governors will have presumably looked at several to get to this stage and picked the one they think best. Hopefully they will explain why well for you.

@EmLaJae I work in education too, and have a positive experience of academies. I would not pre-judge the OP's school's academisation proposal without more information, and neither should you.

A massive impact of Conservative politics is that LA’s cannot open new schools, only a trust can

This is often said but it isn't quite true. An LA wanting to open a new school must look for proposals to establish an academy, but they can still build the school themselves if they don't receive any satisfactory proposals.

They can also sponsor a new free school in collaboration with other groups, so long as they have less than 20% representation on the MAT board. Some examples here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_free_schools_in_England_with_a_local_authority_sponsor

Many of the large MATs have become so big and are the power is not within the school to allocate its own budget as was the original intention with grant maintained schools. There is lack of scrutiny on the MAT budget with high salaries for an excessive management tier in some MAT's. Some MATs are excessively prescriptive and show a lack of flexibility in approach - they want all their academies to be the same.

Again, you are talking in generalities ... you don't know the size or nature of the MAT that the OP's school might join. Local Authorities can also be prescriptive in their approach - that is why many schools have embraced academisation.

But there is no basis for you to say there is a "lack of scrutiny". Academy accounts are scrutinised by the DfE: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/academies-financial-returns