Looking back over the 2024-25 academic year, we are once again especially proud of all of our staff and young people and what they have achieved. Staff worked with all our young people to help them achieve their potential and to make them felt supported throughout the academic year. We also celebrated 10 years of being “The Education Alliance”.
As we have grown as a Multi-Academy Trust, we have welcomed more church schools into the TEAL family. Our values already align well with the Church England in their priorities; however, we have Richard Winks – our Church Lead – who works collaboratively with the Diocese of York. This close partnership with the diocese strengthens our work, enabling shared learning, guidance and support across all our schools. This ensures that we remain open and welcoming to schools of all faiths and none.
This annual report captures some of our successes, community engagement and outcomes, along with what we feel are some of priorities for the forthcoming academic year.
Download the full review here or see below for a summary.
Our Organisation
The Education Alliance Multi-Academy Trust was established in 2015 so that South Hunsley School and Sixth Form College could support the setting up of Hunsley Primary School, the East Riding’s first Free School. Since then, a further ten schools in the region have joined:
In addition to the twelve schools, the trust also operates Yorkshire Wolds Teacher Training, the only Outstanding SCITT based in East Yorkshire, which is training a new generation of primary and secondary teachers in East Riding and Hull.
Trust Growth
The 2023-24 academic year saw four new schools join the TEAL family of schools, with Naburn CE Primary School and Beverley Minster CE Primary School joining as sponsored academies. Following this, we embarked on a period of consolidation. This included ensuring that our Primary School Improvement offer was fit for purpose, as this had been the main growth area for us. Kris Henderson, Director of Education (Primary), has worked closely with the heads of all schools and his Primary Subject Leads (PSLs) to continue to collaborate, reducing workload wherever possible.
As the trust expanded to twelve schools, the demand for the centralised school support functions also grew. To enable us to fully on-board the new schools and to continue to provide the required support to our existing schools, the School Support Team worked with stakeholders from across the trust as we reviewed the systems in place for HR and recruitment, payroll, budgeting and invoice processing. A significant investment both in time and money saw us procure a number of new systems which would enable processes to be streamlined and simplified for all users.
The Ace House at Malet Lambert – which runs as a small satellite of The Hub School – saw its first intake of eight students in the Autumn Term. Pupil attendance increased and there was also a considerable increase in their lesson engagement. The Ace House team have worked hard to ensure that pupils have a calm arrival (including breakfast) and are ready for learning. The pupils are benefiting from a slightly shortened day compared to that of Malet Lambert alongside shorter lessons with breaks, which is helping them to focus and engage on their learning. The pupils then transition back to school after completing a successful half term. The team at The Ace House work in close liaison with the leadership and pastoral team in the main school, allowing the pupils to feel connected to their mainstream placement. When asked what they like about The Ace House, the students said they liked the food, the staff support and the shorter days.
Debbie Dalton, TEAL Safeguarding Lead, increased her time working in the School Improvement Team to two days per week this year, supporting schools with their safeguarding arrangements and undertaking a review on the use of the Child Protection Online Management System (CPOMS) across the trust. This led to her developing guidelines on best practice and templates to ensure consistency for the recording of information across the twelve schools.
We have continued to work with the DfE and Local Authority on the pre-opening for The North Star School, our SEMH Free School. Following lengthy meetings with the project team, a design concept was agreed and a detailed School Specific Brief was completed. Due to the delay in the publication of the SEND White Paper, the SEND wave of the Free School Programme is currently paused; however, the project has completed the feasibility stage and is ready to progress, depending on communications from the DfE.
Governance
Following an external review of the trust’s governance arrangements, in 2024-25 we implemented the NGA’s best practice advice regarding terms of office and we bade farewell to a number of long-serving governors and trustees; we were enormously grateful for the time and effort they gave so freely to support all of our schools. We embarked on a renewed recruitment process (alongside early succession planning with all Chairs) and we recruited a record number of new governors to support our schools. We were delighted that Helen Shepherdson, Bridget Wilkinson, Jaime Pearce, Amy Kelly, Claire Chappell, Nick Holmes, Claire Young and Ian Stewart all agreed to take roles as Chair of the Local Governing Bodies and we look forward to working with them closely.
We were delighted to welcome Emma Train-Sullivan and Carl Derving as new trustees. Emma is a dedicated leader within the NHS and is also the creator of the nationally recognised Social Mediation and Self-help programme (SMASH). Emma has previously worked collaboratively across Hull and East Riding schools as the Early intervention and Prevention lead at Humber Teaching Foundation Trust and is passionate about education and early intervention to support wellbeing and mental health. Carl is Chief Financial Officer at a local food processing business based in Hull. Carl is also an ex-pupil of South Hunsley High School, and was a student of the current chair, Karen Dow. Since leaving school, Carl has been working within accountancy and finance since 2002, starting out as an apprentice. We look forward to working with them both in their trustee roles and to the valuable contributions that they will make.
Following a national recruitment process in January, we received confirmation that Mari Palmer had been appointed as the new Diocese of York Educational Trust Member representative. We were delighted as Mari worked closely with TEAL and the Wolds Associate Research School for a number of years. Mari has served as a headteacher for the last ten years and also has experience as a MAT trustee, already making a fantastic contribution to TEAL.
Following York City Council being awarded the contract for outsourced governance and clerking services previously, it was necessary to re-tender for this contract; following a detailed procurement exercise, we were delighted to re-engage the services of Helen Marshall-Groot and her team at York City Council for a further two years. The feedback from Local Governors regarding the service provided is overwhelmingly positive, with the team working well with our Headteachers and Chairs to build agendas, support with meetings and monitor the training across the trust.
This academic year saw a new look for our governor development sessions. Building on the comprehensive training suite offered by Helen and her team at York City Council, we surveyed members of all Local Governing Bodies to ascertain what they felt would be useful and to identify any gaps. The school support team then reviewed the responses and constructed bite-sized, tailored CPD carousels which governors could opt into attending.
TEAL Pupils & Students
Team TEAL
28 New Teachers
Staffing remained stable throughout the academic year and retention rates have continued to be high. Teaching vacancies have continued to be advertised to Yorkshire Wolds Teacher Training colleagues where possible (in line with our trust policy).
Outcomes
As ever, we should congratulate all of our students for performing strongly across all our schools. This year saw more variability in outcomes across our schools, especially those where attendance has been more of a challenge; this pattern is repeated regionally and nationally.
Nationally, the pattern of results emerging shows that in schools and communities with higher levels of disadvantage and higher levels of absence, results have been lower. Conversely, where schools have a higher number of pupils who are not disadvantaged, had plenty of support outside school during the pandemic and have attended well, those pupils and schools have done well.
Year 1 Phonics pass rate = 80% / National = 80%
Year 6 achieving expected standards in RWM = 66% / National = 62%
Year 11 achieving English and maths at 4 or above = 65.1% / National = 64.5%
Year 11 disadvantaged pupils Attainment 8 = 35.9 / National = 34.9%
Progress 8 = -0.05 / East Riding (-0.13) & Hull = (-0.52)
Year 11 grades at 9-5 = 43.4% / East Riding = 42.4% / Hull = 36.2%
Sixth Form Average Points Score per A level = 34.1 / East Riding = 32.6
Emerging Priorities
We continue to work to our dedicated TEAL Strategy 2024-28 and to focus our work in the 5 key areas of our strategy. This strategy is intentionally highly ambitious. We may not achieve them all, but for the next four years we will focus all our work on delivering them; it will become the mission of leaders, trustees and governors and everyone who works for TEAL to deliver this strategy and truly fulfil our core purpose.
By 2028 we will:
- 1Be a family of at least 15 schools across Yorkshire, delivering high-quality inclusive education to 8,000 young people and operating efficiently and effectively.
- 2Train 100 highly effective new teachers each year who are equipped for long, successful careers in schools.
- 3Train 10 future Headteachers for Yorkshire schools, who lead ethically and are deeply connected to their communities.
- 4Lead the sector in staff satisfaction and engagement.
- 5Deliver equally high-quality education and positive staff experience in each TEAL school.
- 6Have a school place for every young person in our communities and ensure the needs of all young people are met.
- 7Have a great teacher in every classroom, all of whom are committed to and capable of delivering high quality inclusive education.
- 8Lead the sector in retention of new entrants to the profession.
- 9Ensure every young person in a TEAL school feels seen, valued, heard and has a strong sense of belonging.
- 10Ensure all our young people read fluently, can fully access their curriculums and are equipped with strong literacy skills.
- 11Offer a high-quality programme of personal excellence and provide every young person enjoys at least one enrichment experience every year.
- 12Ensure all young people who attend TEAL schools gain good qualifications, thrive educationally, and are on a pathway to higher education, an apprenticeship or a fulfilling job by the age of 19.
- 13Give all young people access to mental health support in our schools.
- 14Give all young people access to speech and language support.
- 15Operate early help and support services that reduce the burden on NHS and other services and place our schools at the heart of the communities we serve.
- 16
Have contributed significantly to positive reform of the school system to make schools more inclusive.
- 17Be an exemplar for high-quality inclusive education and be at the forefront of a network of trusts and other partners developing, promoting and supporting high-quality inclusive education.
