Leadership of School Trusts in England During the Pandemic

This paper reports the results of a mixed methods study that sought to capture rich, complex, national, real-time data of the leadership of school Trusts in England during the COVID-19 pandemic. This exploratory research provides new empirical evidence of how system leaders of 29 school Trustsacross England responded to the challenges brought by the pandemic. It demonstrates that although there are many similarities between these leaders and those of standalone schools, there are also fundamental differences, and that these have implications for system leaders’ preparation and support.