Governors, Governance and Government

: Investigating the Role of Chairs of Multi-Academy Trusts at a Time of Change and Complexity in the English School System

Abstract

Since 2010 the educational system in England has been both disrupted and reorganised by the introduction of academies. This period has seen ‘middle tier’ oversight of local authorities removed and partially replaced by multi-academy trusts (MATs). It has also seen a centralisation of educational policy and accountability in the Department for Education and its Regional Directors. The governance of schools has been similarly transformed and there is a body of literature chronicling and criticising this change. The role of new MAT Boards and chairs has had relatively little attention. This thesis begins to address that gap.
The research was conducted using a Mixed Methods approach structured in two parts. The first was comprised of a Critical Policy Discourse Analysis of governmental policy documents relating to the governance framework 2004-2022. The second part was a Critical Discourse Analysis of semi-structured interviews with 10 chairs of MATs exploring their professional backgrounds, training, experience of board leadership and interaction with and accountability to central government.
The study notes the waning of discourses of school autonomy in both government policy and in the experience of the chairs. It also describes an increase in discourses of control by central government and observes a lack of clear policy on the development of academy governance after 2016 and a period of ad hoc regulation by officials. Chairs of MATs are new actors who are expert mediators of this new terrain and who network widely to develop knowledge capital and to influence government. The thesis explores interpretations of meta-governance and Foucauldian concepts of governmentality.
What emerges is a view of chairs as sceptical yet willing partners with government in operating a complex and paradoxical system. Discontinuities with traditional school governance are greater than the continuities, so MAT level governance is better understood in terms of the corporate governance.

Date of Award	11 Sept 2024
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	University of Portsmouth
Supervisor	Joseph Burridge (Supervisor), Simon Edwards (Supervisor) & Lexie Scherer (Supervisor)