School year reforms plans 'will not happen' this Senedd term

Plans to change the school term dates and redistribute school holidays "will not happen this Senedd term", said the cabinet secretary for education, to allow staff in the education sector the chance to deliver other reforms.

Education secretary, Lynne Neagle, said: “My starting point is always the best interests of children and young people. This means ensuring reforms are properly planned out and have the time and space to succeed.

The decision follows a mixed response from the biggest Welsh Government education consultation on record, generating well over 16,000 responses, which sought views on changing the school calendar to spread school holidays out more evenly across the year.

“Opinion was hugely divided on this."

The decision followed a mixed response from the biggest Welsh Government education consultation on record, generating over 16,000 responses, which sought views on changing the school calendar to spread school holidays out more evenly across the year.

Proposals suggested moving a week from the start of the summer break into the autumn break creating a two-week half term to improve the education experiences of young people especially the most disadvantaged, and align more with how families live and work.

While a narrow majority of responses were in favour of changing school holidays, the findings from the consultation were unclear and contradictory, highlighting that more discussion is needed to make sure future amendments benefit everyone.

Ms Neagle, education secretary, said: "To ensure we get this right, we need to continue listening to and engaging with schools, teachers, unions as well as children, young people and parents on how best we can implement any changes in the future.

“I am acutely aware we are asking a lot of teachers and schools. They are supporting our ambitious transformation of education in Wales and they need the time and the space to ensure these reforms deliver for children and young people. I want to prioritise ongoing school reforms and improving attainment and therefore, no changes will be made to the school year this Senedd term."

The public consultation on whether to change school term dates, redistribute school holidays and amend the length of terms, ran from November 21, 2023 to February 12, 2024.

The Welsh government was considering the change, as the school year in Wales has not changed in over 150 years and "was designed for a very different time, when going to school was voluntary, there was no national curriculum and children were expected to contribute to the agricultural economy during the long holidays".

Eithne Hughes, director of the Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL) Cymru, said: "We are relieved that this decision has been made, although calling it a ‘pause’ sounds like a face-saving exercise as it is surely pointless to go round this loop again.

"As the consultation proved, and as we knew all along, there is no unanimous call from parents or teachers for changes to be made to the school holidays."

Ms Hughes, added: “It’s disappointing that this issue has been given such high priority by the Welsh government.

"There are so many more pressing challenges in education, such as embedding a new curriculum, dealing with funding and teacher shortages, and improving rates of pupil attendance.

"We hope the government can now focus its attention on the issues that really matter and move on from this consultation which has been an unwelcome distraction and an enormous waste of time.”

Tom Giffard MS, shadow education minister for the Welsh Conservative Party, said: “Education in Wales is in crisis with soaring absenteeism, a shocking decline in education standards, the worst PISA results in the UK and rising incidences of violence plaguing our schools.

“We have long called for the Labour Government to scrap this distraction and get on with tackling the problems they have created in education over the past 25 years.

“Kicking this into the long grass is not good enough, Labour cannot ignore every teacher’s union, let alone the tourism and business sectors, who are against the plans, the policy needs to be scrapped completely.”