A leading headteacher who was awarded an OBE after setting up a high-achieving free all-through school is offering to train others to become successful headteachers.

Ed Vainker, who co-founded Reach Academy Feltham in a deprived area of South London, is also offering to help others set up similar free schools in “vulnerable” areas around the country - and says he has already had interest from as far afield as Manchester, Middlesbrough and Hastings.

He wants to see 10 such schools set up, but believes they need to have local people behind them to work - and so plans to train them in the ‘Reach Blueprint’.

Reach Academy Feltham, an all-through school catering for pupils aged 3-18, was built eight years ago this month in an area that had suffered problems with community cohesion, including support for the BNP.

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Within a couple of years the school was judged “outstanding” and the first cohort of GCSE candidates achieved some of the best results in the country.

Mr Vainker, who says he is driven by a belief in social justice, now wants to replicate the success.

He said: “There are people who see the value of things like all-through [schools] and of a deeper community relationship who, with the support we could potentially offer, could have the confidence to potentially pursue this in a way they might not have done otherwise.”

His plan, along with his school’s co-founder Rebecca Cramer, includes a “school leader fellowship” in which prospective school leaders will spend a year training at his school. The year will include a three-week stint in the US, partly at high-performing schools around New York.

Vainker added: “We know of people who have not lasted through their first 18 months of headship because they weren’t as prepared as they could have been.

“We want to support people who want to make that jump, and we can offer something that’s super practical around things like school finances and how admissions work in a lot of detail. Some of that stuff you sort of find out on the job, and it doesn’t need to be that way.”

Vainker, who took a career break from teaching and spent five years in America, which he described as “really valuable experience”, said ideal candidates would be those with a track record in schools who had also spent time out of the system.

Meanwhile, groups and individuals who want to set up free schools will be handed a “blueprint” or manual of how things are done at Feltham - from early years to curriculum to community organising.  

The target over the next seven years is to create 10 “really high-performing schools in communities that are vulnerable” and to train up to 40 people on the school leader fellowship programme.