Education

There's a lot about education in the B&R this week - or at least, about the provision of school buildings. The County Councillors seem to be fixated on numbers and £ signs, without any consideration for the real children and their families who will be affected by all the disruption that the plans for school closures will cause. There have been protests in Ystrydgynlais, and at Bronllys parents have managed to keep their local school open at least until a new one is built in Talgarth. The original plan was to shunt the children to Talgarth, and then move them again when the new school was built there.
Glasbury, too, seems to have got a stay of execution, to accommodate the children who will eventually go to a new Hay school. One of the parents, Andrew Jones, who is now chairman of the pressure group Primary Education in Glasbury and Gwernyfed, is quoted as saying: "What we're doing now is scrabbling about and leaving a generation of children and parents uncertain where provision will be in the next three to five years. It's a woeful legacy."
Meanwhile, various other local schools will be "remodelled" to cope with extra children - which led Councillor Claire Powell (for Bronllys) to ask what exactly "remodelling" meant.
Gareth Ratcliffe asked, in Council, whether the County Council has any other ways of funding a new Hay school if the private funding falls through. The answer he got wasn't exactly illuminating. To quote from the article: 'The report states: "The prospects of selling the existing Hay school site remain uncertain however in any event will be dependent on the developer obtaining planning permission from the national park for various building projects in Hay."