Our role as system leaders

Our National Support School has a track record for rapid transformation, founded on clear expectations, a visionary curriculum approach and robust systems for mutual accountability. By working closely with other schools, we draw on expertise across our network of schools and teaching hubs to ensure sustainable school improvement.

The Trust began with Jerry Clay Academy (JCA), which has proudly served as a National Support School for the past nine years. During this time, JCA has delivered intensive support to over 24 schools, securing improved Ofsted outcomes with sustainable, long-term impact. Alongside this, JCA has welcomed over 700 schools locally and nationally through large-scale conferences and high-quality professional development.

This legacy has enabled us to grow both our capacity and our influence. Over the past six years as an English Hub, we now support more than 150 schools, sharing evidence-informed practice and building strong foundations in early reading.

As a National Support School and English Hub, our driving purpose has always been to transform children’s lives in some of Yorkshire’s most disadvantaged communities. We are committed to raising aspirations and enabling every child to make a meaningful contribution within and beyond their local community.

Many of the schools we support serve communities with high levels of deprivation and a legacy of underperformance. Our mission is to continue working alongside schools that have historically struggled to fulfil their potential. Through strong leadership, a values-driven approach and uncompromising ambition, we demonstrate that all children can succeed.

Our growth as a Trust

Since our inception, our Trust has grown thoughtfully and purposefully, bringing together schools that share our vision and commitment to excellence.

Stanley Grove Academy joined the Trust, alongside Jerry Clay Academy at its inception in October 2023, followed by Townville Academy, as a sponsorship in June 2024. Smawthorne Henry Moore joined in February 2025, and most recently, Auckley Academy became part of our Trust in November 2025.

Each school has played a vital role in shaping our collective identity and strengthening our capacity to drive improvement across the system. Across all our academies, we have seen impressive outcomes and rapid improvement. We firmly believe this success is rooted in our strong culture of teamwork, the comprehensive wraparound support we provide, and our shared ambition to ensure that every child accomplishes great things.

As we continue to grow, we remain committed to maintaining this collaborative approach—ensuring that every new school benefits from, and contributes to, our collective strength and expertise.

Our collaborative network of partnerships

At AMAT, collaboration is at the heart of school improvement. We believe that meaningful, sustainable change happens when schools and organisations work together—sharing expertise, challenging thinking and learning from the very best practice both within and beyond our Trust.

Our reach is increasingly national. Since establishing our Accomplishing Great Things Together Training Centre in September 2025, we have already delivered professional development and support to over 300 schools across the country. The centre provides a powerful platform for connecting educators, developing expertise and sharing evidence-informed practice at scale.

We continue to build on strong strategic partnerships with local authorities across Wakefield, Leeds, North Yorkshire, the North East, Kirklees, Hull and Lancashire. As one of just 34 English Hubs nationally, we also work closely with the Department for Education, multi-academy trusts and teaching school hubs, contributing our expertise to improvement across the wider education system.

From September 2026, we are proud to lead the Accomplish Early Years Stronger Practice Hub, extending our impact into the early years and supporting settings for children from birth to five across Wakefield, Doncaster and Hull.

These partnerships create a powerful network through which expertise can be shared, effective practice can be scaled and schools can both contribute to and benefit from collective improvement. By drawing on the knowledge, experience and capacity of schools, trusts, local authorities and teaching hubs across our network, we ensure that improvement is collaborative, evidence-informed and sustainable.

This is what Accomplishing Great Things Together means in practice: connecting people, developing expertise and building collective capacity so that great practice reaches more schools, more settings and, ultimately, more children and young people.

Our impact to date

Our impact is measurable, sustained and far-reaching. We have a strong track record of translating evidence-informed school improvement into demonstrably better outcomes for schools, staff and, most importantly, children.

Through 24 intensive school improvement projects, we have successfully improved the Ofsted rating of every school we have worked with. Most recently, we supported three schools within a single academic year, with all three moving from Requires Improvement to Good with Outstanding features—demonstrating the strength of our partnerships, the precision of our approach and our ability to secure improvement at pace.

Our impact in early reading and phonics is particularly strong. Across our English Hub partner schools, phonics outcomes have increased by 14 percentage points from baseline, demonstrating the difference that high-quality, targeted support can make. Within our own Trust, pupils achieved a combined 96% in the Phonics Screening Check, reflecting the strength and consistency of early reading provision across our schools.

Our contribution to phonics improvement across Wakefield and Barnsley has also supported both local authorities to become among the highest-performing areas nationally, ranked 3rd and 2nd respectively in 2023–24.

This strength extends well beyond early reading. Across our Trust schools, all statutory performance indicators are well above national outcomes, reflecting an embedded culture of high expectations, expert teaching, strong leadership and continuous improvement. Our outcomes demonstrate that improvement is not short-term or isolated—it is sustained, scalable and built into the culture of our schools.

Our influence now extends far beyond our Trust. Through our Accomplishing Great Things Together Training Centre, we have delivered professional development programmes and support to over 300 schools nationally, and that reach continues to grow. By sharing expertise, developing leaders and strengthening classroom practice, we are building capacity not only within individual schools but across the wider education system.

Behind every statistic is our fundamental purpose: better teaching, stronger leadership and improved outcomes for children. We believe that when staff are empowered with the right knowledge, expertise and confidence, they can accomplish extraordinary things—and by working together, that impact can reach far beyond a single school or Trust.

Looking ahead

As we continue to grow as a Trust, our ambition remains clear—to extend our reach and deepen our impact. We will build on our proven model of school improvement, invest in leadership at all levels and strengthen our partnerships across the system.

We are committed to shaping a self-improving school system—one where collaboration, integrity and excellence drive sustained change. By continuing to work alongside schools, leaders and communities, we will ensure that every child, regardless of background, has access to an exceptional education and the opportunity to thrive.