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Guidance

Understanding your data: a guide for school governors and academy trustees

Information to help school governors and academy trustees analyse and understand performance data for their school

Updates to this page

From:
Education and Skills Funding Agency
Published:
26 June 2018
Last updated:
1 September 2022
Show all updates

  1. We have refreshed the understanding your data: a guide for school governors and academy trustees for the new academic year.

  2. We have updated and improved all sections to provide new information and to reflect changes in policy.

  3. Added a bullet point in section 3 for Integrated Curriculum and Financial Planning (ICFP)

  4. We have updated the understanding your data guide and exception reports.

  5. Included CTA for completion of the Understanding your data feedback survey.

  6. We have updated the guide with links to new and updated tools that help schools reduce costs pressures and make every pound count.

  7. First published.

This publication was withdrawn on

This resource is no longer being updated. Refer to the Academy trust governance guide or the Maintained schools governance guide.

Applies to England

Documents

Understanding your data: a guide for school governors and academy trustees

HTML

Exceptions report template with guidance notes

ODT, 36.7 KB

This file is in an OpenDocument format

Exceptions report - anonymous example A

ODT, 40.5 KB

This file is in an OpenDocument format

Exceptions report - anonymous example B

ODT, 41.7 KB

This file is in an OpenDocument format

Details

Who is this publication for?

This information is for:

  • academy trustees
  • maintained school governors
  • executive leaders
  • local authorities
  • local governing boards and clerks

Use the exceptions report template as a basis to have structured discussions with your board. This will help the board to understand the issues and challenge leaders to understand and contribute towards improvements.

The exceptions reports show anonymised examples which can be used as a guide.

Expiry or review date

This guidance will be reviewed before September 2023.

Contact ESFA

If you have any feedback on this guidance and the templates, please contact us using our online enquiry form:

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For all enquiries for the Education and Skills Funding Agency

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