THE RESPONSE to the damning Estyn inspection report will not be just a “tick the box” exercise to get the inspectorate off their back this time around, a Powys education chief has said.
At a meeting of Powys County Council’s Learning and Skills scrutiny committee on Monday, June 16, councillors and lay members received a report on school standards and improvement.
The report included the education service’s integrated business plan (IBP) which is a response on how the council will try and change things to improve education in the county over the next five years.
By the end of that five year period the council hope that all primary schools and only one secondary or all through school will be in an Estyn follow up category.
Head of school improvement and learning Anwen Orrells said: “Since April 2022 when inspections restarted after Covid-19, every Powys secondary and all through school has been inspected and either placed in an Estyn review category or follow up category of significant improvement or special measures.
“That in itself is a stark statement.”
Cllr Angela Davies (Liberal Democrat) told the committee that the “cynic” in her wonders if things are going to be different this time around.
Cllr Davies: “Estyn inspections over a very long period of time have been yo-yoing, where we seem to be very good at improving but not sustaining that.
“I’ve read reports in the past that the Chweched/Sixth was going to resolve all our problems with the sixth forms, but it wasn’t, and Estyn have told us it was a terrible idea from the start.
“Again, we had a report in Ysgol Calon Cymru and if we amalgamated these two schools (Builth Wells and Llandrindod Wells high schools) it was going to be great, and it wasn’t.
“How can we be convinced that what you have put in this paper is the right thing to do?”
“Can we get this right once and for all?”
Director of education Dr Richard Jones said: “From the moment we received the Estyn report we have been clear about the messages.
“I don’t think we have sugar-coated the report or made excuses.
“There’s been absolute clarity around what the situation is and there’s been an acknowledgement of the need to improve standards.”
Dr Jones continued: “It strikes me form what I have learnt about how we have approached things historically, that in response to an Estyn inspection we have written a plan for the inspectorate, limited to the recommendations.
“The result of that way is that our focus becomes narrow which is to tick a box in order to move out of an Estyn category.”
Dr Jones explained that the response to Estyn in the Post Inspection Action Plan (PIAP) “is part” of a service improvement plan which considers wider points than what the inspectorate noted.
Dr Jones said: “We are stepping up as a council to understand where our responsibility lies in driving up the standards in our schools.”
He added that the council was getting to the “nub” of the problem.
Dr Jones said “Which is around the relationship we have with our schools and that function of providing challenge and support and what does it mean.
“We’re in that period where we are redefining that to get the culture right to deliver on the strategy.
“We’re not scared of getting to the root of some of our historic problems which account for the yo-yoing.”
The committee will be given quarterly updates on how the improvement plan is working.
