For our recent report ‘Grow your own: Best practice for developing teaching talent in school trusts’, we surveyed trusts across England and had in-depth conversations with multi-academy trust (MAT) leaders. 

The report explores how professional development supports teacher recruitment and retention, providing trusts with key insights into how they can develop their professional development offer to create a talent pipeline that stabilises their future. 

One type of professional learning we explored was through professional partnerships and networks. We found nearly 90% of responding MATs participate in internal professional networks and nearly 70% collaborate with other trusts or international partners.

But why do partnerships matter – and how can trusts ensure they’re making the most of their professional networks and partnerships? Here's what we found.

The benefit of professional partnerships 

Nearly half of trusts we surveyed said that a strength of their professional development offer was creating networks and professional learning communities.

Professional partnerships and learning communities support professional development by enabling communication between schools, which supports collaboration and shared learning.

Networks multiply learning by: 

• Enabling sharing of best practice 

• Expanding perspectives 

• Providing space to share expertise  

This supports your professional development offer by making learning in your trust go much further, as each school shares their own learning with others. 

Similarly, networking can take place between different trusts, providing an opportunity for trusts to learn from each other and share best practice beyond their own schools. 

As well as encouraging shared learning, this has the added benefit of boosting a trust’s reputation. 

How trusts can build partnerships 

Here are some of the most effective ways we found for trusts to build successful professional networks and partnerships: 

Create professional learning communities

Formalising cross-school professional learning communities gives structure to your trust’s professional network. These can be split by role, as one trust leader told us: 

“We’re increasing the number of professional communities we’ve got, so our SENDCOs will meet, as will the HR reps and the attendance leads. It gives us an amazing opportunity to have a professional conversation about the day to day and how we can make teaching better.” 

This provides staff with the opportunity to learn from others who share their role and understand their daily reality, which means learning can be more readily applied to everyday practice. 

Utilise technology 

Enabling remote networking helps you overcome potential issues that might arise when staff are busy – in-person collaboration can be difficult to fit in with heavy teacher workloads and busy schedules. 

You can do this by implementing: 

• Virtual learning networks and communities 

• Collaborative lesson planning for teachers 

• Online professional learning or training sessions, hosted live to facilitate conversations 

Enabling staff to build networks and partnerships remotely increases engagement and means existing workload doesn’t lead to staff members missing out on valuable development opportunities.

Encourage cross-sector collaboration 

Make the most of partnerships and boost their impact with cross-sector and international collaboration. 

This encourages new ways of thinking and gets staff to consider different perspectives and ways of doing things, rather than defaulting to ‘what we always do’. 

You could do this with: 

• Rotating presentations from different schools 

• Case studies and group problem solving between staff in the same role at a range of trusts 

• Creating networks between clusters of schools across trusts, made up of staff in different areas 

Potential challenges 

The primary challenge for trusts in building partnerships is workload. Busy teachers and school staff might not feel that collaboration is a priority, and in-person collaboration can be difficult for trusts with schools in a range of locations. 

If your trusts’ schools are widespread, you could host networks online, so staff don't have to travel and workload becomes less of a barrier. 

You could also consider less frequent meetups as clusters of schools, rather than all schools. 

However, protect some face-to-face collaboration if possible – staff can miss out on valuable interactions if all collaboration is online. 

Another challenge is ensuring partnerships are actually built in a valuable way. As one trust leader explained: 

“The challenge for any MAT is to be clear sighted on the difference between compliance with management direction and genuine partnerships. The latter requires both parties to give and usually won’t get off the ground unless both parties stand to gain something they want, too.” 

This leader also shared their trust’s solution: 

“We have always rooted cross-trust collaboration in a needs-led system: we don't enforce inter-school working for the sake of it. We consult annually with heads on needs and we then match needs with options and choices from across our family of schools.” 

Ultimately, the key to increasing engagement and reaping the benefits of collaboration is to ensure collaboration is designed purposefully and meaningfully. 

A report for ambitious trusts 

Our ‘Grow your own’ report explores how UK trusts develop their teachers and reveals the crucial role that professional development plays in teacher recruitment and retention. 

The report also contains the free ‘grow your own’ framework, a professional development implementation model designed specifically for trusts and school groups. 

Read the report today to learn how you can build classrooms where everyone can thrive. 

Download report