'Significant' failings identified at large Welsh school

Yahoo

11-05-2025

An all-through school has been told it is need of "significant" improvement after a disappointing inspection. Abertillery Learning Community, a mixed comprehensive in Blaenau Gwent, was criticised for a range of failings in the report by education watchdog Estyn.
In 2022 a good report had led to Abertillery Learning Community being removed from Estyn's list of schools requiring significant improvement. But the school has slipped back into that category following its latest inspection, which highlighted issues including that only "a few" primary-aged pupils make strong progress in reading and writing.
The English-medium school, which has 1,666 pupils, "provides too few opportunities for pupils of all ages to develop their literacy and numeracy skills across the curriculum", wrote the inspector.
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The report continues: "In a minority of sessions, teachers do not provide enough challenge or engaging activities. This limits pupils' opportunities to develop independence and thinking skills.
"In these cases, teachers overuse worksheets or talk for too long, meaning that pupils spend less time on meaningful tasks. As a result, pupils rely too much on teacher guidance and do not make sufficient progress, particularly in the upper school."
In some lessons, teachers' expectations of pupils were found to be "too low". The inspector added: "They provide pupils with tasks that are unengaging and lack sufficient challenge. In these sessions, many make limited progress.
"In a few cases, classroom practices, such as having all pupils working at the same pace, further limit the progress that pupils make."
Most lessons were deemed to be "too teacher-led" and did not give children enough opportunities to "take the lead" in their learning. This left some pupils relying heavily on teacher guidance and not being engaged enough, particularly in the upper school.
"In a few cases, the overuse of worksheets limits pupils' ability to develop independent learning skills or to write at length," the report continues.
"In the younger classes, teachers do not provide pupils with sufficient purposeful and challenging independent learning experiences, nor use the outdoors well enough to support pupils' learning."
Written feedback from teachers was only effective in a "few" cases, according to the inspector. "In addition, a minority of secondary aged pupils are over-reliant on their teachers when faced with unfamiliar words," the report goes on.
"In the lower school, many pupils develop their writing skills appropriately and a minority make strong progress with their writing. However, by the end of year six, a minority do not spell or punctuate accurately enough and have weak handwriting. This remains the case as they move through upper school."
Leaders' planning for improvement was found to lack "precision", while Welsh language provision was described as "underdeveloped".
Estyn concluded that the school needed "significant improvement" and an action plan to address four key recommendations.
The recommendations centred on the quality of teaching; literacy and numeracy skills; planning for improvement; and ensuring the school meets the statutory requirement for pupils to study Welsh up to the age of 16.
Headteacher at Abertillery Learning Community Tracey Jarvis said: "We fully accept Estyn's findings and the recommendations and will be working closely with the Local Authority; our school improvement partners and our whole school community to make further progress. A Post Inspection Action Plan has been drawn up as a priority, which will set out how we will address the recommendations and work to make improvements to ensure we are maximising learning and opportunities for all our children and young people.
'I am pleased that senior leadership was recognised as a strength by Estyn, and that this is resulting in high expectations, a clear vision and positive changes to wellbeing, safeguarding and attendance. We are truly committed to bringing about further improvements and building on our successes to date, and I am confident we can do this working in partnership with our whole school community.
'Improving attendance has been a top priority for us and I am pleased that this work has been recognised. Learners can't make progress and reach their full potential without being in school first. Significant changes made at school to manage behaviour was also recognised and that this has resulted in a substantial improvement in pupil behaviour and attitudes to learning.
'We are committed to putting our learners at the heart of this work going forward, their wellbeing, happiness, potential and achievement is paramount.'
Estyn will monitor the Abertillery Learning Community's progress for around 12 months. The school's budget is subject to a deficit reduction plan approved by Blaenau Gwent council.