Cyflwynwyd yr ymateb hwn i'r Pwyllgor Plant, Pobl Ifanc ac Addysg ar Bil y Gymraeg ac Addysg (Cymru)

This response was submitted to the Children, Young People and Education Committee on the Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill

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Ymateb gan: Cyngor y Gweithlu Addysg
Response from: Education Workforce Council (EWC)

Written paper from the Education Workforce Council (EWC) in preparation for oral evidence to the CYPE on 9 October 2024 by Hayden Llewellyn (EWC Chief Executive) and Eithne Hughes (EWC Council Chair) on the general principles of the Welsh Language and Education (Wales) Bill.

The EWC is the independent, professional regulator for the education workforce in Wales. We regulate education practitioners across schools, further education, youth work, and adult/work-based learning. The Education (Wales) Act 2014 formally sets out our aims and functions.

In order to regulate the workforce, we are required to maintain a Register of Education Practitioners (the Register).  As a result, the Register provides a rich source of data about the composition of the education workforce in Wales, across 13 different groups of registered practitioners. Our data includes workforce information such as:

· Ability to speak Welsh, teach through the medium of Welsh, teach Welsh as a second language

· Recruitment and retention

· Employment (including phase, subject, Welsh medium, bilingual or English medium)

· Numbers of teachers who trained through the medium of Welsh

· Supply workforce and their Welsh language ability

As part of our oral evidence, we will provide a high-level overview of our data; however, we would welcome the opportunity provide Welsh Government and/or the CYPE committee with a detailed briefing on our data.  We have provided similar data briefings (and other updates) to Welsh Government’s Welsh in Education Workforce – External Implementation Group, upon which we sit as a member.

It is on the basis of this intelligence, as well as information gathered through our other statutory functions that we will focus our oral evidence on:

· the size of the challenge and the extent of the resources that will be required to achieve the 2050 target

· consideration of the impact of the various requirements of the Bill (listed below) on the current and future education workforce, including implications relating to workload, recruitment and retention and professional learning:

o a duty on the Welsh Ministers to review the Welsh language standards in relation to improving or assessing the Welsh language skills of the workforce

o the goal of pupils achieving proficiency (C1/C2) in Primarily Welsh Language schools and independence (B1/B2) in other categories of school

o requirement placed upon the Welsh Ministers, to produce a framework setting out how they will implement the Welsh language strategy’s proposals in relation to Welsh language education, (lifelong) Welsh language learning, and acquiring the Welsh language

o requirement for local authorities to prepare and implement Welsh in education strategic plans outlining how they will promote and facilitate Welsh language education and use of Welsh in schools within their areas

· changes to the definitions of Welsh language ability, based on the European Common Reference Framework for Languages (CEFR)

· the categorisation of schools according to the amount of Welsh language education they provide

· the opportunities and challenges associated with the requirement for school governing bodies to develop a Welsh language education delivery plan, in consultation with key stakeholders

· the statutory basis for the proposed new body, the National Institute for Learning Welsh (NILW) and the opportunities this presents

· the need for continued strategic collaboration throughout implementation and beyond, it will be essential for Welsh Government to continue to work closely with key stakeholders to maintain a co-ordinated and focussed approach to delivery in this key policy area

· further work to assess the extent of the likely impact of the wide-ranging measures outlined within the Bill upon the workload of teachers, learning support workers and leaders in schools across Wales adequate resources and support for local authorities and schools to facilitate the implementation of the measures outlined within the Bill

· the interrelationship of the Bill with the new curriculum and ALN Bill needs to be properly understood and should be clearly communicated and articulated to the sector

Hayden Llewellyn

EWC Chief Executive

30 September 2024