Structured governance assurance for UK school governing boards.
Governance Assurance
The operating system every other part of the school has, finally built for the board. Free entry checks to start; membership connects the Audit Hub, Risk Register, Governance Improvement Plan, Annual Governance Statement, Board Intelligence and trust oversight.
Start free
Pick the one that matters most for your school this week. Each runs against public data, your live website or a short set of questions, and gives you something concrete to take to the next board meeting.
Scans your school website against the DfE statutory publishing requirements. Flags what is missing, what is out of date, and what the next inspector will see.
Run free check → FreePulls public DfE data for any school: attainment, attendance, Ofsted history, workforce, finance. The figures your board should know before its next meeting.
Run free check → FreeA confidential self-assessment of how the school is governing the use of AI. Surfaces the conversations the board should be having with the head this term.
Run free check → FreeA quick check on the school's preparedness for Martyn's Law. Identifies the practical steps governors should sign off this year.
Run free check → FreeFor Catholic and Church of England schools. Walks the board through every SIAMS or CES element and prints a prioritised action plan.
Run free check → FreeWalks the board through the statutory safeguarding basics every governing body is accountable for, then prints what to put right first.
Start the audit → FreeChecks whether your induction actually keeps new governors past their first year, and builds the induction that does.
Start the audit → FreeMatches your school to grant funders by phase, region and focus. Shows the funding worth a closer look, with a link to apply to each.
Find funding → FreeFor anyone thinking about it. A few plain questions show where you would fit on a school board, and how to start.
Explore the role →The system underneath
Most boards quietly rest on one or two people: the head, the chair, the clerk. If any of them leaves, the quality of governance leaves with them. The framework moves what is in their heads into a system that outlasts the people in the roles. Good governance should be a right, not a matter of chance.
Three stages of governance maturity. Every tool produces evidence that maps to one of the three stages, so the board sees where it is and where it is going.
Compliance
The board is legally constituted, properly structured, and meeting its statutory obligations.
Assurance
The board can evidence that school improvement is happening and governance is having impact.
Continuity
Governance survives change. The system outlasts the people. Succession is built in.
What membership unlocks
Membership is designed so every governor on the board can perform their role effectively, with clarity, term after term. Each tool earns its place by saving the board time or producing evidence the board can show.
The Headteacher Report is the spine. The head completes it once a term. That one structured input feeds the live overlay on the School Data Check and the Board Intelligence Report pack the board takes into its meeting.
Governor Assurance Plan
One of the three strands of the Governor Assurance Plan. Upload the School Improvement Plan, priorities extracted, governor visits organised across three stages of the year.
Governor Assurance Plan
Every statutory governor monitoring role, each with a term-by-term visit plan and a downloadable report.
Compliance
Reads inside every linked PDF on the school site. Flags dead email addresses, out-of-date references, spelling and grammar errors, and template text that was never edited. The judgement work a regex crawl cannot do.
Meetings
Structured agendas for nine standard meetings, with statutory items flagged on the right termly cycle. Every item carries its framework reference and plain-language guidance for the chair.
Meetings
Upload a set of board minutes. Scores the challenge written into the record across six dimensions, and surfaces every challenge moment it found so the board can see what scrutiny reads like on paper.
Reports for the board
A termly wizard for the head. One structured input becomes the live overlay on the School Data Check and feeds the Board Intelligence Report. No duplication, one source of truth.
Reports for the board
The membership upgrade to the free School Data Check. The moment the headteacher locks their termly report, this term's figures appear as a live overlay on the public dataset.
Reports for the board
The termly board pack volunteer boards never had the resources to commission. GIAS, Ofsted, Companies House, financial benchmarking, DfE performance data, the Headteacher Report and Quality Standard progress, assembled for governors in one place.
Governor Assurance Plan
The faith strand of the Governor Assurance Plan: a dedicated visit builder for foundation governors in Catholic (CES) and Church of England (SIAMS) schools, with monitoring records the board can file as evidence.
For trusts
An exception-first view across every school in the trust: Attendance, Safeguarding, Finance, Governance, Workforce. The headline answers which schools need attention right now, rather than leading with completion percentages.
£229per school / year, from
Every member tool included. Invoice or purchase order accepted.
See the member tools →Use the arrows, drag, or scroll → to see every tool.
Pricing
No tiers. Every member tool, every update, every term. External QS verification is a separate paid product.
Primary / Nursery
£229
per school / year
Secondary / FE
£329
per school / year
Annual billing. Invoice or purchase order accepted. Same per-school price across a MAT or LA. One invoice. No volume discount. The trust value is the Trust Command Centre, with Audit Hub findings and every school's risks rolling into one oversight view. See the full membership breakdown on the Membership page.
For Multi-Academy Trusts
The Trust Command Centre gives the central team an estate-wide view that surfaces which schools need attention right now, across attendance, safeguarding, finance, governance and workforce. Audit Hub findings and every school's risks roll into one place. Same per-school price across a MAT or LA. One invoice. No volume discount. The trust value is the Command Centre and connected oversight, not a lower fee.
Talk to us about trust onboarding →Get in touch
We will reply within one working day with next steps and an invoice or purchase order if you want one. Whether you are a chair, a clerk, a headteacher or a MAT governance lead, the form below is the right place to start.
Thank you. We will be in touch within one working day. If you have not heard back, email info@governanceassurance.co.uk.
The founder
I have spent 20 years in education, as a senior leader, as a governor and now leading governance training and development across 500 schools in Lancashire. This is not a product built from the outside looking in. It is built from inside the work.
Working across hundreds of schools, one pattern kept coming back: every function in a school has a structured improvement system. Except governance.
| Function | Has a system? |
|---|---|
| Curriculum | Schemes of work, assessment, subject reviews |
| Safeguarding | KCSIE, SCR, annual audit, designated lead training |
| Finance | SFVS, internal audit, benchmarking, scheme of delegation |
| Governance | No equivalent. Volunteer boards left to improvise. |
That is not a criticism of governors. Governors are some of the most committed volunteers in public life. They have never been given the infrastructure they deserve. When a strong chair leaves, the system does not survive, because there was no system.
So I built one. The School Governance Assurance Framework organises governance into a structured system for the first time, supported by practical tools that turn the work governors already do into evidence the board can show. Doing the governance and producing the evidence are the same act.
The vision
The long-term goal is for the framework to become an accredited standard for school governance, the governance equivalent of an ISO. First, we improve governance with practical tools. Then, the award stages provide formal recognition. The accreditation comes when the foundations are in place across the sector.