Trustee/Non-executive Director at HISP Multi Academy Trust, Eastleigh

HISP Multi Academy Trust comprises five schools - three secondary and two primary – across the Solent area. Three further secondary schools are approved by the DfE’s Advisory Board to join in 2023. This is anticipated to increase the annual budget to around £50m in 2023/24.

In addition to the schools in the trust, a number of ‘outreach’ services are managed via the ‘HISP Learning Partnership’:

• Two teaching school hubs, delivering professional development training to teachers across 600+ schools
• Maths Hub
• School-centred Initial Teacher Training (SCITT)
• Research School
 

The Trust Board is looking to recruit several Trustees overall, possessing a breadth of skills, knowledge and experience but principally focused on the areas of:

•    Finance
•    HR
•    Legal
•    General Management
•    Education (ideally with recent secondary experience)

The Trust also needs to ensure there is a Chair or Chair-in-waiting lined up through a piece of dedicated succession planning activity, as well as a Vice Chair, as it prepares to enter a cycle of end-of-terms-of-office for incumbent Trustees.

While there is no specific expectation of new Trustees to be prepared to take the Chair/Vice-Chair positions, interest in these roles is welcomed.

Among its upcoming challenges and priorities, HISP MAT is about to embark on a transformation programme to evolve the organisation and processes to be fit for purpose for the new, and future, scale of the Trust.

The skills listed will be invaluable in ensuring that adequate and appropriate consideration is given to the various functions that are required for a successful operation. Beyond the transformation, specialist skills are needed to ensure that the Trust navigates its future growth ambitions in a sustainable manner.

Being a trustee for HISP means that you are setting and evolving the strategy for education for over 7,000 young people. You will have strategic responsibility and oversight of over 1,000 professionals who deliver for HISP MAT’s learners, as well as reaching out to train and develop many hundreds of current and future educators.

The Trust’s short term challenge is the consolidation of the organisation from its recent rapid growth whilst continuing to deliver great education to learners. 
The medium term focus will be to transform the organisation and processes to be efficient and effective for current and future scale. 
The longer term challenges will be to navigate the Trust through the macro-educational landscape and government policies, likely to be part of a more consolidated Trust-centric model across the UK.