Work to turn around the failing education system in Powys is starting to bear fruit, a senior councillor has explained.

At a Powys County Council meeting on Thursday, December 4, former council leader Cllr James Gibson-Watt, who has stayed on in cabinet and taken on the tricky education brief, gave councillors an update on work being done to respond to Estyn’s scathing report, which was published earlier this year.

Ahead of the meeting, the council had revealed that Brecon High School had been moved out of special measures following an Estyn monitoring visit in November.

Cllr Gibson-Watt (Liberal Democrat – Glasbury) said: “The children of Brecon and the surrounding area deserve a top-quality high school and that’s very much on the cards now.

“It’s a great boost to the school and everybody involved. We are very firmly on an improvement journey.”

He explained that this means that across the council, in schools, and in partner organisations there is now an “absolute commitment” to raise standards and drive sustained improvement.

Cllr Gibson-Watt said: “I’m pleased to say that Estyn has said our integrated business plan (IBP) is the appropriate mechanism to guide the improvements we wish to see.”

The overarching IBP points the way to improving education in Powys over the next five years.

This document goes further than the Post Inspection Action Plan (PIAP) that the council submitted to Estyn over the summer, which was produced in response to the recommendations set out in their report.

Cllr Gibson-Watt said: “There’s always a concern that we’re doing these things just to please Estyn. But that’s not the case. We’re doing this to improve outcomes for our learners – that’s our number one priority – and if it pleases Estyn at the same time, all well and good.”

He added that exam results were “better” this summer but are still “not good enough.”

The council already knows how pupils in Powys performed in their GCSE and A-level exams last summer, and members of the council’s Learning and Skills scrutiny committee examined these draft results in detail during a confidential session in September.

But the wider public in the county will need to wait a little while longer to find out until the Welsh Government publishes verified data on exam results for the whole of Wales. This is expected to happen sometime in January.

Cllr Gibson-Watt said: “They are improving but it’s really clear that they are still not achieving as well as they should, so that is a really high priority and a clear focus for the Education Service and our schools.”

He added that the gap between Powys results and other counties is “growing” at sixth form level and this is why the council is looking to reorganise sixth forms.

Cllr Gibson-Watt also pointed out that school inspection results are improving.

“We’ve had six primary schools inspected since September and they have all been positive,” he said.

Council chairman, Cllr Willam Powell (Liberal Democrat – Talgarth) thanked Cllr Gibson-Watt for a “very comprehensive update.”