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No. | Item |
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APOLOGIES To receive
any apologies for absence. Additional documents: Minutes: Councillors Aled
Evans, Huw Wyn Jones, Keith Jones, Elfed Roberts and Gareth Williams; Anest
Gray Frazer (Church in Wales) and Rita Price (Catholic Church). |
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DECLARATION OF PERSONAL INTEREST To receive
any declarations of personal interest. Additional documents: Minutes: No declarations of personal interest were received from any members
present. |
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URGENT BUSINESS To note any
items that are a matter of urgency in the view of the Chairman for
consideration. Additional documents: Minutes: None to
note. |
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The
Chairman shall propose that the minutes of the previous meeting of this
committee held on 23rd January, 2018 be signed as a true record (attached). Additional documents: Minutes: The Chair
signed the minutes of the previous meeting of this committee held on 23 January
2018 as a true record. |
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GWYNEDD FOUNDATION PHASE OUTCOMES PDF 444 KB To consider
the report of the Cabinet Member for Education
(attached). *10.10am
– 10.55am Additional documents: Minutes: The
report of the Cabinet Member for Education was submitted, noting the outcomes
of the report commissioned into the Foundation Phase. During
the discussion, the following main points were highlighted: ·
Despite the finding that social skills were lower
among children than in the past, the performance in Gwynedd in terms of the
personal and social indicator was high and suggested that it was not as great a
problem as the linguistic factor. ·
The fact that the performance among children in
Gwynedd in terms of output was third throughout Wales, including in the
language field, suggested that the primary system as a whole was functioning as
it should and that children were leaving the primary system with the necessary
skills to enable them to reach their full potential. ·
Pressure should be put on governors to make every
effort to employ Welsh speakers for every post at a school, although admittedly
this could be challenging in some areas. ·
the report jumped from one thing to another rather
than concentrating solely on the foundation phase. ·
several references were made in the report to the
weakening of the Welsh language, e.g. the comment that not every staff member
adhered to the school's language policy at all times and that they turned to
speak English with non-Welsh speaking pupils.
There was also a suggestion here that children were allowed to answer
tests in English when the situation arose, contrary to the policy of responding
to tests in Welsh. It was also necessary
to bear in mind, when referring to pupils with 'English as an additional
language', that English was also an additional language for the 64% of the
children of Gwynedd who came from Welsh speaking households. ·
there was no reason why all children, with the
exception of newcomers, could not pursue their schooling in Welsh. ·
the fall in the number of Welsh speakers at our
primary schools was a cause for concern and this needed to be addressed at once
or there was a danger that the numbers would fall to such a degree that it
would not be possible to justify the policy at all. ·
It was acknowledged that immersion education in the
foundation phase was critically important and that the language centres played
a very important role in immersing KS2 pupils. ·
Although it was understood that there had been no
empty spaces at these language centres to date, should such a situation arise
in future, consideration could be given to extending the provision beyond year
2 only, but bearing in mind that the younger the child, the less pertinent the
course was to them. ·
there was room to strengthen the bridging element between
the foundation phase and meithrin groups in the field of oracy. There were some excellent people in the
meithrin groups who promoted language acquisition skills and who also had clear
expertise in the foundation phase who could also assist meithrin groups so that
the children's baseline would improve when they started attending school. · It was not believed that there ... view the full minutes text for item 5. |
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ADDITIONAL LEARNING NEEDS AND INCLUSION PDF 1 MB To consider
the report of the Cabinet Member for Education
(attached). *10.55am
– 11.40am Additional documents: Minutes: Submitted
- the report of the Cabinet Member for Education, giving an outline of the
Additional Learning Needs and Inclusion Service that came into force in
September 2017, detailing the main successes of the service and the fields that
required further development to ensure an effective and efficient service to
the Gwynedd and Anglesey Education Authority partnership. During
the discussion, the following main points were highlighted: ·
The Other Net programme, which supported parents where
there was uncertainty or lack of understanding of the implications of home
education, was praised and it was noted that individuals who had been outside
the education system for years had moved back into mainstream education with
the input of this programme and Comic Relief.
Councillor Cemlyn Williams declared a personal interest, as he was a
director of Cwmni Sylfaen which had links with this programme in the past. He was not of the view that it was a
prejudicial interest and did not leave the meeting. ·
Schools were central to the success of the new system
and it was important that the teachers / assistants received the necessary
training to move this forward. ·
The support of the Health Board was also central to
the success of the service. ·
Concern was expressed that the Counselling Service
currently had a waiting list of almost 100, but collaboration with CAMHS was
welcomed. It was noted that this work
bisected the remits of several scrutiny committees and that preventive philosophy
was also becoming more prevalent in schools.
It was noted that there was a need to look at the reasons for the
increase in anxiety among young people. ·
The report did not refer to able and talented
children, who were also children with additional learning needs. ·
the service was very much appreciated in the main
stream. ·
the individual development plans were long-winded
documents that generated an additional workload for schools. The Area
Education Officer was asked to give his impressions of how things had
progressed so far and of any problems he anticipated in future. He noted that: ·
the changes had been substantial and significant, not
only to include the provision for schools and the way of working with schools,
but also in terms of the work across two counties. ·
That an important element of the success of Phase 1 of
the statutory review was that, as a whole, the process had responded to any
changes as it progressed. Nevertheless,
some things had already changed, in response to the observations made by
schools and in order to make the service even more efficient. ·
Since it was a very broad field and that questions
often arose, the user group was set up so that the improvement process could
continue indefinitely. ·
Phase 2 of the review would mean more changes again,
and that lessons learnt in Phase 1 would be incorporated in Phase 2 so that it
could be considered as part of the brief for the next steps. · the plan to rationalise the team, etc., had addressed half the anticipated ... view the full minutes text for item 6. |
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PRINCIPLES OF AN EDUCATION SYSTEM WHICH ARE FIT FOR PURPOSE PDF 373 KB To consider
the report of the Cabinet Member for Education
(attached). *11.40am
– 12.25pm *estimated
times Additional documents: Minutes: Submitted
- a report on behalf of the Cabinet Member for Education seeking the opinion of
the scrutiny committee on the proposed education principles that would form the
basis for fulfilling the Education Department's vision for the system to ensure
a high quality of education for the children and young people of Gwynedd for
the twenty first century. Based on
the results of the consultation with Governors and schools, and the Education
Department's vision, members of the scrutiny committee were specifically asked
for their views on the following principles that were being considered as the
foundation for the education system for Gwynedd in future: ·
A system of viable secondary schools; ·
Two age ranges within the same class in the primary
sector; ·
Approximately 80% of non-contact time for the Head
teacher to concentrate on leadership issues in the primary sector. Based on
readily available information, the following observations were highlighted
during the discussion: ·
There must be clarity about what the impact of
adopting these principles will be. ·
It was likely that a teacher or a teacher's hours
would be cut in some schools and that would be very difficult for a head
teacher, especially if he/she was in charge of two or three schools. ·
This was only the beginning and there was a great deal
more scrutiny to be done. ·
The lack of applicants for posts in the majority of
primary and secondary schools was a cause for concern. ·
The system was too fractured to attract the next
generation of leaders. For example,
department heads at the smallest secondary schools did not have the opportunity
to develop leadership skills because, as single person departments, they did
not have the time to lead the department and there was no one in the department
to manage it. Furthermore, since primary
schools were often too small to have a deputy head teacher, opportunities here
were also lacking for people to develop leadership skills. ·
The substantially greater demands imposed on people
with regard to educating and leading meant that posts in schools had become far
less attractive. ·
The questions in the questionnaire could have been
more penetrating, e.g. rather than asking only for an opinion on the statement
"It is important to give Head
teacher enough time to manage and lead ...", the respondents should
also have been asked whether they agreed with the statement despite its
implications. ·
As regards the suggestion that secondary school head
teachers should be in charge of around 900 pupils, there was a wish to see
robust evidence in support of this in the form of research work in this country
and throughout Europe about the size of school that worked best and yielded the
best result among children. ·
Although the intention to merge some small schools to
make them more viable was welcomed, this was not practically possible in
Gwynedd at present and the head teachers would spend a large proportion of
their time travelling between sites. · the colleges' recruitment policy, which insisted that those seeking to pursue ... view the full minutes text for item 7. |