Running a school is a challenge. Running multiple schools across an educational trust? That’s a whole new level of strategic juggling. Trust leaders are tasked with ensuring every school under their wing is performing at its best, but how do you keep a bird’s-eye view while also knowing when to zoom in and take action?

The key lies in data—clear, trust-wide insights that help leaders make informed decisions, redistribute resources effectively, and build and maintain collaboration between schools. Because let’s be honest, no one wants to be making big calls based on gut feelings alone.

One of the trickiest challenges of overseeing multiple schools is ensuring consistency in assessment and outcomes. Without robust moderation processes, schools risk working in silos, each interpreting standards differently.

By embedding trust-wide moderation practices, leaders can:

• Create a shared understanding of expectations across all schools.

• Build confidence in assessment reliability.

• Ensure students across the trust receive fair and consistent evaluations.

Bringing schools across your trust together for collaborative moderation not only refines assessment accuracy but also strengthens relationships between staff across the trust. And let’s be honest—what better way to break down barriers than a good debate over what constitutes ‘secure’ writing in Year 8? Combining that with transparent, assessment data tracker on Pupil Progress facilitates the conversations, helping your teams focus their conversations on pedagogy, next steps and ways to improve rather than figuring out each how each others spreadsheets work.

No school operates in isolation, and often the best solutions are already within your trust. High-performing departments, innovative teaching strategies, and effective intervention methods shouldn’t be closely guarded secrets—they should be shared assets.

 Facilitating structured collaboration between schools allows:

• Strong departments to mentor others in need of improvement.

• Teachers to share best practices through networking and CPD resources.

• Schools to align on key priorities while respecting individual school contexts.

Why bring in expensive external consultants when the expertise is already in-house? By fostering a culture of shared learning between team members, trusts can drive improvement without reinventing the wheel.

Our study with NCFE showed how having consistent tracking with Pupil Progress helped to facilitate conversations between school leaders. Time saved on setting up and managing complicated spreadsheets was instead focused on meaningful conversations to move students forward.

Managing multiple schools effectively requires a clear, comprehensive view of performance across the trust. Pupil Progress’ trust dashboard equips leaders with a powerful tool to track A8 and P8 performance, offering insights into both tangible average unit grades and teacher-predicted grades. Trust leaders can check progress accurately, spot trends and take action where it is needed most. This empowers you as a leader to:

• Monitor Trust-Level Performance – Compare school-by-school progress over time and spot patterns early.

• Optimise Resource Allocation – Direct staffing, funding, and support to areas that need them most.

• Enhance CPD Opportunities – Identify professional development needs and tailor training accordingly.

• Foster Collaboration – Connect high-performing schools with those needing additional guidance, sharing best practices across the trust.

With these insights available, trust leaders can go beyond reactive decision-making. They can take a proactive and strategic approach to improve student outcomes. A well-informed trust is an empowered trust, ready to steer its schools toward long-term success.

Steering educational improvement across a trust isn’t about quick fixes or reactive decision-making—it’s about using data smartly, fostering collaboration, and ensuring every school benefits from shared expertise.

With trust dashboards, strong moderation, and teamwork, trust leaders can use live tracking data to improve at the most impactful points across every subject's curriculum delivery. Because when schools work together, everyone wins—especially the students who stand to gain the most.