A not-for-profit organisation responsible for the management of its partner academies and the provision of education to the pupils in its schools.

The PFT was set up at The Barnehurst Federation of schools in South London in October 2013. Since then, it has grown steadily to become a primary-only trust of 10 schools across Bexley, Gravesham and Medway. We opened our first Free School in September 2020.

Our vision is to be First Class for outcomes and overall pupil experience; First Choice for parents choosing a school and for staff developing their careers; and First Voice as thought leaders, pushing boundaries and raising standards. To ensure we achieve our vision, our three core values underpin every decision we make. Adventure, which is about being bold, courageous, taking risks and pushing boundaries; Creativity to ensure we are innovative, with clear thinking and good application of our ideas to create new and better ways of doing things; and Excellence so we are always aspirational, committed to the highest standards, ambitious and dedicated to brilliance.

Because we nurture, celebrate and value the distinctiveness of our schools. We know each of our schools have their own unique character and ways of doing things that best serve their communities. Being part of The Primary First Trust is about celebrating our diversity, learning from and challenging each other, and using our different experiences to enhance and inform practice to grow ever stronger together. We are more than a Trust, we are a community, a family. We all work together to support each other to ultimately give our children the best start in life.

We work hard to ensure we add value to our schools. We have a range of Trust services that provide high-quality expert advice and support in core functions to ensure compliance and best value, whilst reducing the burden on schools and creating Headspace for our Head Teachers to focus on our pupils’ education. We strive to enhance the overall school experience for our teachers, staff and pupils by creating the best learning and working environments. We work with our schools to secure the best provision for our pupils, whilst reinvesting every possible pound directly into education, leading to enhanced opportunities and for our pupils and staff.

Absolutely not! In fact, we want to help you enhance and refine who you are.

At first, very little. The school’s name will not change, nor will the uniform, timings of the school day. Over time, though, our investments in people, facilities and ways of working will clearly show improvements across the board whilst always retaining the school’s identity and ethos.

Again, very little at first, as the essential look and feel of school life will be retained, but we hope our approach will deliver great outcomes and improvement in the overall pupil experience that they will find inspirational.

We know that great education is only possible with great teachers. We support our colleagues every step of the way to help them to deliver high-quality education and care. We empower all our colleagues to develop their careers with us according to their aspirations through our high-quality tailored CPD programme.

A Head Teacher in The Primary First Trust will always be responsible for every aspect of school life and remain the key decision-maker. Our Governance Partners work closely with the Head and their leadership team adding their input into the strategic process and as advocates in the broader community. They play a full part in reviewing the school’s performance against its Strategic Plan and may be invited to join the sub-committees to the Board of Trustees according to the skills and experience they bring.

We support all our schools, at all stages of their journey, to continually develop and improve their provision, develop an innovative, high-quality and unique curriculum, create exceptional experiences, embody inclusive practices and deliver excellent teaching. We have a robust school improvement framework driven by the school’s Strategic Plan that supports our schools in education, safeguarding, health and safety, data protection, finance, HR , Marketing and governance. We also have the trust-wide School Development Group that champions collaboration, innovation and the sharing of best practice to enhance provision. We welcome and commission independent audits to benchmark our progress. Our model develops detailed continuous improvement plans that are reviewed every 6 weeks. At the end of every long term, we share best practice across the Trust. We see school improvement as giving our school leaders the expertise, knowledge, resources, support and challenge to ensure we have an excellent teacher for every child, and we are always First Class, First Choice and First Voice.

We take the time to get to know each new school and understand what makes them unique and different, what their challenges are and importantly who they are, and give them a chance to get to know us. With the SLT, we audit current performance across a range of measures, identify any gaps and work together on an improvement plan. We work in 6-weekly cycles and share our experiences across the Trust every 12 weeks.

We have dedicated specialist services in HR, Finance, IT, Estates and Facilities, Marketing and Customer Experience and Central Administration. We take particular pride in our Trust philosophy on, and management of funding, putting value at the heart of financial planning so our schools are financially sound whilst ensuring high-quality provision.

Our governance is about 3 things: Clarity; Connection and Impact. We also actively engage with our communities through exciting partnerships. We truly value our close-knit Trust community and experience the benefits of us knowing each other, working together and the honest and real collaboration it creates.

From our Early Career Teachers to our support staff and our leaders, we ensure each colleague’s pathway to progression and continuous improvement is clear with a variety of training programmes available to stretch, challenge and inspire. We also have established networks throughout the Trust where like-minded colleagues can share experiences and inform best practice. We continue to be incredibly passionate about career development and have plans in place to further develop our talent management programmes.

Call: 01322 640066
Email: office@theprimaryfirsttrust.co.uk
To make an appointment to speak with the CEO: email sthompson@theprimaryfirsttrust.co.uk