Action plan focuses on raising standards in county’s schools (From Western Telegraph)

Action plan focuses on raising standards in county’s schools

1:50pm Saturday 22nd October 2011 in News

A draft action plan to improve education results in Pembrokeshire was discussed in detail at a recent extraordinary scrutiny committee meeting.

Estyn gave Pembrokeshire County Council’s education service an overall judgement of unsatisfactory after an inspection in June.

The capacity to improve was also considered unsatisfactory.

The Estyn report was published at the same time as a scathing joint report by Estyn and CSSIW into safeguarding children.

The education inspection authority had required that improvement plans be presented by the end of this week.

At an extraordinary Children and Families Overview and Scrutiny Committee meeting on Thursday, October 13th, members discussed the plan, which aims to improve standards across the county.

The county council’s director of education, Graham Longster, told members: “This plan and our approach need to be able to reassure the regulators that we are seriously intending to demonstrate improvements.”

This year’s exam results were much better than in 2010, but improvements still need to be made, the committee heard.

The plan, which was approved by cabinet on Monday, focuses on raising standards in schools, particularly at the end of key stage four, increasing attendance rates by the end of the academic year and improving the working of the overview and scrutiny committee.

It will also look at improving the accuracy and rigour of the authority’s own evaluations of how well the council and its partners perform and improve the access to mediation services for parents and carers.

“The measure of the work will be next year’s results,” said Mr Longster, adding that a lot of the work is already happening.

Committee members were broadly in favour of the plan and intend to discuss each section in greater detail over the next three meetings.

katy.woodhouse@ westerntelegraph.co.uk