United Learning: a model for trusts working with Maths Hubs

The context

The Maths Hubs Programme serves all state-funded schools in England, including those in trusts. Sometimes this means one trust working with multiple hubs, as trusts may span several hub boundaries. United Learning has over 100 schools across England, of which around half are secondaries. These schools are located in hub areas throughout the country, from North North West Maths Hub in the north, to Boolean in the west, and Kent and Medway in the south-east.

When United Learning began working with Maths Hubs, the partnership involved high-level system leadership facilitation, to enable as many teachers as possible to access the fully-funded CPD available, and find a bespoke model to align with United Learning’s maths strategy. Now the partnership is maturing, and the relationship is providing a model for other trusts.

• LEARN MORE: Understand how MATs can work in partnership with Maths Hubs

The timeline

In 2018, United Learning began a relationship with the NCETM at system leadership level, working with an Assistant Director from the NCETM’s System Leadership Team to develop the trust’s strategy for primary maths. By 2022, the partnership had developed, and Maths Hubs began to get involved more directly with United Learning’s schools and teachers. Representatives from the NCETM and Turing NW Maths Hub led sessions at United Learning’s northern conference, and leaders from London South East Plus Maths Hub did the same at the southern conference.

Meanwhile, United Learning’s Director of Maths explored the professional and school development programmes offered by the NCETM and Maths Hubs that would be most suited to United Learning’s needs. By January 2023, there were representatives from United Learning taking part in the Secondary MAT Maths Leaders Community, and, following the green light from the trust’s CEO Jon Coles, planning started for teachers from the trust to get involved in LLME (local leaders of maths education) development programmes including Mastery Specialists, as well as the Specialist Knowledge for Teaching Mathematics (SKTM) Programme for Secondary Non-specialist Teachers, and bespoke Teaching for Mastery Development Work Groups.

• DISCOVER: Find out about all these CPD projects, and how to get involved

2023 saw the relationship between United Learning and Maths Hubs develop further: a summer start for the SKTM Programme enabled non-specialists teaching maths to get support for their subject and pedagogical knowledge, and Maths Hubs were represented at all United Learning conferences. In the early stages, local leaders of mathematics education from outside the trust offered their expertise at these conferences, but over time, the trust’s own teachers enhanced their expertise with their hubs, and presented it to their colleagues.

System leadership support between the trust and hubs was facilitated by United Learning’s maths advisers and leaders in each hub. Schools in the trust were all contacted by their local Maths Hub so conversations could happen about each school’s maths CPD needs. All messages were echoed in the trust’s newsletters, so a common approach and understanding underpinned the involvement trust-wide.

The focus

United Learning’s Director of Maths decided early in the partnership to focus on hubs working with the trust’s secondary schools; the ultimate aspiration is for all trust schools to participate in teaching for mastery programmes with their local hub. Initially, Mastery Specialists from within and outside the trust worked with groups of United Learning schools, and mastery started to develop in their maths departments. The groups were put together based both on locality and the needs and context of the schools involved. At all times it was a true partnership, with CPD activity embodying the trust’s strategy for maths, the requirements of the schools taking part, and the Maths Hub’s fidelity to the principles of mastery.

Over time, the schools participating in these groups will move into Work Groups (local, collaborative CPD clusters) with schools outside the trust who are at a similar stage in their mastery journey. This outward-looking approach enables United Learning to grow local relationships further, and to continue developing its own teachers.

Our trust is working in partnership with Maths Hubs because we want all teachers to use the Five Big Ideas in Teaching for Mastery in their lessons. Teachers are supported by Mastery Specialists to develop their pedagogy alongside colleagues from other local trust schools. Together they share best practice, resources and ideas to ensure the powerful knowledge in our curriculum is implemented effectively. 
Director of Maths, United Learning

The programmes

Mindful of the national shortage of maths teachers, the trust’s leadership team took advantage of another programme offered by Maths Hubs – Specialist Knowledge for Teaching Mathematics: (Secondary Non-specialist Teachers). The Director of Maths at United Learning is involved in delivering this, and is a local leader of mathematics education for the local Maths Hub, London South East Plus. 

As a Cohort Lead for the SKTM Programme, the Director for Maths formed a national cohort of those teaching maths in United Learning schools who had not trained in maths. Upskilling the trust’s teachers in this way was significant in staff retention; it developed the confidence of those teaching maths outside their subject area, and helped them understand both the subject and the pedagogy behind it. As an LLME leading a cohort, the Director of Maths made the Non-specialist Teachers Programme bespoke to United Learning’s teachers, adapting the order of sessions to suit the trust’s curriculum, for example. 

“Teachers are more confident planning and delivering lessons and are starting to engage with the Five Big Ideas by discussing the importance of representations, variation and non-examples.”

Being part of the LLME Community with London South East Plus also meant that the Director of Maths at United Learning received support with professional development. LLMEs are experts in leading maths curriculum and pedagogy, maths professional development, and maths school development, and work together as a hub-based group each year to hone and refine these skills.

• FIND OUT: What’s involved in being an LLME?

The curriculum

The trust’s maths departments have also been using NCETM materials to support their curriculum, underpinning this with professional development activity so teachers engage fully with their planning. United Learning wants to ensure that, whilst high-quality centralised resources are part of the planning process, teachers are not de-professionalised and instead feel empowered to enhance lesson resources using teaching for mastery approaches.

This work represents just the start of United Learning’s partnership with Maths Hubs. The trust’s vision is for all its schools to work with their Maths Hub, and for there to be at least one Mastery Specialist in each geographical cluster of schools. It is hoped that the model established by United Learning – focusing on the development needs of groups of its schools, and the retention of its workforce – will be adopted and developed by trusts across England working with their Maths Hubs.