School Leadership and Administration in England

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Education in the United Kingdom is devolved, and Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland run their own school systems. This profile covers England only. What distinguishes England is the extent to which responsibility for schools has moved away from local government. Most pupils now attend academies, which are state-funded but run by charitable trusts that answer to the Department for Education (DfE) rather than to a local authority. Headteachers are appointed by the school’s own governing body or trust, not by a central ministry, and no leadership qualification has been legally required for the post since 2012. Accountability rests heavily on external inspection by Ofsted, whose framework was substantially redesigned in 2024 and 2025.

At a glance

FeatureEngland
Responsibility for schoolsDfE nationally; local authorities for maintained schools; academy trusts for academies
Academies (January 2026)48.2% of state-funded schools, attended by 60.4% of pupils (DfE, 2026a)
School-level governanceGoverning body (maintained schools); trust board, often with local committees (academies)
Who appoints headteachersGoverning body (maintained schools); trust board or its delegate (academies)
Required qualification for headshipNo mandatory leadership qualification; the NPQH has been voluntary since February 2012
Leadership preparationNational Professional Qualifications (NPQs), including headship and executive leadership
Professional standardsHeadteachers’ standards 2020 (non-statutory)
Inspection bodyOfsted; report-card inspections since 10 November 2025
Compulsory schoolingTo the last Friday in June of the school year in which a pupil turns 16; education or training then required to 18
International surveysTALIS 2013 and 2018; England did not take part in TALIS 2024

Governance and school autonomy

Maintained schools are funded through and overseen by local authorities, although each has its own governing body. Academies receive funding directly from central government under a funding agreement and are run by academy trusts, which are charitable companies. A trust may run one school (a single-academy trust) or several (a multi-academy trust, or MAT).

DfE census figures for January 2026 show that 48.8% of primary schools and 83.9% of secondary schools were academies or free schools, together educating 60.4% of all pupils (DfE, 2026a).

In a maintained school, the governing body has three core functions: setting the school’s vision and strategic direction, holding the headteacher to account for educational performance, and overseeing financial resources. It has at least seven members, including elected parent and staff governors, a local authority governor and the headteacher (DfE, 2025a). In a trust, the board of trustees holds these responsibilities for all its schools. Trust members can appoint trustees as set out in the trust’s articles of association, and the board can delegate functions to local committees through a scheme of delegation, which must set out what has been delegated and what the board has retained (DfE, 2025b). Academies have had freedom over curriculum, pay and staffing, although the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Act 2026 narrows some of these freedoms (see below).

Becoming a principal

Headteachers are appointed locally. In maintained schools the governing body is legally responsible for selecting the headteacher under the School Staffing (England) Regulations 2009 (DfE, 2025a). A trust board must appoint a senior executive leader, normally the chief executive in a MAT, who should also be the accounting officer (DfE, 2025b). How headteachers of individual academies are appointed depends on what the trust’s scheme of delegation assigns to the board, the executive and local committees.

The Education (Head Teachers’ Qualifications) (England) Regulations 2003 required people taking up a first headship in a maintained school, from 1 April 2004, to hold the National Professional Qualification for Headship (NPQH) or an equivalent, with transitional arrangements for those appointed before April 2009. SI 2012/18 revoked these regulations with effect from 8 February 2012, so the NPQH is no longer compulsory and schools decide whether to ask for it. The NPQH survives as one of a suite of reformed qualifications, with new frameworks in use from 2021. The suite currently includes leadership NPQs in senior leadership, headship, executive leadership, early years leadership and special educational needs co-ordination, alongside specialist NPQs in areas such as leading teaching and leading behaviour and culture. For the autumn 2026 cohort, scholarship funding for the headship NPQ was available to teachers and leaders in publicly funded schools, subject to limited places, and heads in their first five years who were taking or had completed the NPQH could join an early headship coaching offer (DfE, 2026d). The executive leadership NPQ is aimed at executive headteachers and trust chief executives who lead several schools.

The principal’s role

The Headteachers’ standards 2020 replaced the 2015 national standards of excellence. They are non-statutory guidance for headteachers, for those who hold them to account and for those who train leaders. They open with a section on ethics and professional conduct and then set out ten standards, ranging from school culture, teaching, and curriculum and assessment to organisational management, partnership working, and governance and accountability (DfE, 2020).

In MATs, leadership is often layered. A chief executive leads the trust, executive headteachers may oversee more than one school, and headteachers or heads of school lead individual sites. This arrangement links to wider debates on distributed leadership.

The most recent international data on headteachers in England come from TALIS 2018. Lower-secondary heads reported spending 25% of their time on administrative tasks and 27% on leadership tasks, compared with OECD averages of 30% and 21%. They had spent fewer years as heads than the OECD average (6.3 years against 9.7) but much longer in other management roles (13.2 years against 5.3). Lower-secondary heads reported working around 62 hours a week and primary heads around 57, and 43% of lower-secondary heads described their workload as unmanageable (Jerrim & Sims, 2019). In 2020 the DfE withdrew England from TALIS 2024, saying it wanted to reduce the data-collection burden on schools (Dickens, 2020), so no newer TALIS figures exist for England (see our datasets page).

Inspection and school evaluation

Ofsted inspects state-funded schools, and its framework has changed twice in quick succession (see also educational supervision models). On 2 September 2024 the government announced that single-word overall effectiveness grades, such as “outstanding” or “inadequate”, would end with immediate effect. For the rest of 2024/25 parents saw four sub-judgements instead (DfE, 2024).

A renewed education inspection framework, with report cards, came into use on 10 November 2025. Schools are graded in six evaluation areas: inclusion; curriculum and teaching; achievement; attendance and behaviour; personal development and wellbeing; and leadership and governance. Early years and sixth-form provision are graded where relevant. Each area receives one of five grades: exceptional, strong standard, expected standard, needs attention or urgent improvement. Safeguarding is judged separately as met or not met, and there is no overall grade. Full inspections normally last two days, and schools are inspected about once every four years (Ofsted, 2026a).

Of the 921 full inspections carried out between 10 November 2025 and 31 March 2026, 85% graded leadership and governance at expected standard or above, and safeguarding was met in 99%. Ofsted stresses that these early inspections covered only 4% of schools and are not representative (Ofsted, 2026b). The first of Ofsted’s planned annual updates to the inspection materials applies to inspections from September 2026. For schools, it adds wording on comparing pupils’ attainment and progress with those of similar schools, on mobile phone policies, and on leaders’ engagement with pupils with special educational needs and disabilities and their families under inclusion (Ofsted, 2026c).

Teacher appraisal and professional development

In maintained schools, the Education (School Teachers’ Appraisal) (England) Regulations 2012 require an annual appraisal against the Teachers’ Standards and individual objectives. The governing body appraises the headteacher with the help of an external adviser, and the headteacher appraises other teachers. Academies are not bound by these regulations and set their own policies. From the 2024/25 pay year, the School Teachers’ Pay and Conditions Document no longer requires pay progression in maintained schools to be tied to appraisal outcomes. The DfE updated its guidance on appraisal and pay policies accordingly in July 2024.

Current reforms and debates

Three developments stand out. The first is the RISE programme (Regional Improvement for Standards and Excellence), launched in 2025. It gives all schools access to advice and shared practice and offers targeted support, through DfE advisers, to schools that Ofsted identifies as needing it (DfE, 2026c).

The second is the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Act 2026, which received Royal Assent on 29 April 2026. For schools, it removes the presumption that new schools will open as academies (free schools) and repeals the duty to make an academy order for a maintained school causing concern, so conversion of such a school to academy status is no longer automatic. It also introduces Ofsted inspection of academy trusts and will require academies to follow the national curriculum and to meet requirements on teacher qualifications and pay and conditions. Its provisions come into force on different dates, several of them in 2027 or later (DfE, 2026e).

The third is the schools white paper, Every child achieving and thriving, published on 23 February 2026. It proposes moving towards all schools being part of school trusts, including trusts established by local authorities, alongside independent inspection of trust quality. It also proposes a new mentoring and coaching offer for headteachers and a pilot of a place-based headteacher retention incentive (DfE, 2026b). Our page on school improvement discusses related research.

Comparison with Turkey

The two systems differ most clearly in who chooses the headteacher. In England the decision is made by the school’s governing body or trust, and preparation is voluntary. In Turkey, principals are teachers appointed by the provincial governor for four-year terms after a written examination and a training programme at the National Education Academy. Inspection also differs. Ofsted is a single national body that inspects whole schools on a fixed cycle, whereas Turkey combines a central Inspection Board with education inspectors in each provincial directorate. See how school principals are appointed in Turkey and education inspectors in Turkey.

FeatureEnglandTurkey
Who appoints principalsGoverning body or academy trustProvincial governor, on the proposal of the provincial director
Selection methodLocal recruitment process run by the governing body or trustWritten examination and ranking, then training at the National Education Academy
Required preparationNone mandatory; NPQH voluntary since 2012National Education Academy programme (2026 regulation)
Term of officeOrdinary employment contractFour-year terms, maximum eight years in the same school
School inspectionOfsted, a national inspectorateMinistry Inspection Board and provincial education inspectors

Key takeaways

  • In January 2026 academies made up 48.2% of state-funded schools but educated 60.4% of pupils, so most pupils attend schools run by trusts rather than local authorities.
  • Headteachers are appointed by governing bodies or trusts, and no leadership qualification has been compulsory since 2012.
  • Ofsted dropped single-word grades in 2024 and since November 2025 has published report cards with five-point grades in six areas and a separate safeguarding judgement.
  • The 2026 Act brings academies closer to common national rules and introduces inspection of trusts, while the February 2026 white paper proposes that all schools should eventually belong to trusts.

Sources

Last reviewed: October 2026

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