6. What is the Welsh Government's position on bringing uniformity to the setting of INSET days across schools in Wales? OAQ53561

Thank you very much. Currently, the content and timing of INSET days is for local authorities, governing bodies and headteachers to determine. As you will be aware, last week, I launched a consultation on proposals for additional national professional learning INSET days for the next three academic years, which include questions on the timing of those additional days specifically.

Thank you. There has indeed been much debate and commentary on the interesting question of whether there could be some harmonising of INSET days across the nation, and with the announcement of introducing a welcome further sixth professional teaching learning INSET day, the Welsh Government has stated within its consultation that the aim for all schools is to fix the same date for it. If this comes to fruition, what analysis could the Welsh Government give to assessing the teaching value of INSET days being worked together in one convenient week? And outside of the majorative and substantive value to teacher learning, perhaps it could also be an opportunity to look at providing some mechanism for families to get the chance to get away at an affordable price during term time, and thereby countering rip-off holiday Britain, which is to the detriment of the consumer, but mostly to the detriment, educationally and pedagogically, of all involved?

Rhianon, as you say, the consultation does look to the possibility of a national training day associated with the implementation of the new curriculum, but I don't want to prejudge the consultation. What I can say to the Member is that we've had over 300 responses to the consultation already and, when you consider that it was only launched last week, that is an amazing response.

I am aware that for some families financial constraints mean that they do look to take children out of school to enjoy a family holiday, and undoubtedly when holidays in Wales are different to that across the border in England, as it recently has been for half term, that can have a substantial impact on the prices that families have to pay. But, of course, my concern when organising INSET days is not to think about the convenience of the price of a holiday, our INSET days are there to provide teachers with the opportunity to engage in professional learning and to prepare themselves for the challenges of the new curriculum. 

Minister, I understand obviously the consultation about at the moment about introducing the extra INSET days to prepare teachers for the new curriculum that will be coming forward. Interestingly, the proposal, and it is only a proposal, is about having that INSET day on the same day across Wales, I believe I'm correct in saying. How confident are you that there is the capacity to deliver the training opportunities the length and breadth of Wales, if such a national INSET day was introduced, because surely there potentially is a capacity issue to deliver those training platforms in every school across the length and breadth of Wales?  

Thank you, Andrew. You are absolutely correct that the consultation does propose a single national training day for the next three academic years in preparation for the curriculum. What I would say to you is that you are taking, if I may say so, a rather old-fashioned view of what professional training actually looks like. The days of when we sent everybody to a WJEC conference, where people sat all day and listened to the sage on the stage and then took that professional learning back to their school, and in many cases did nothing with it, is not what we're proposing. The best professional learning happens when professionals work alongside each other in their clusters, in their catchment areas, and with their subject and age specialists. So, this idea that we will have to have hordes of so-called professional experts out in our schools is not how we are approaching it and is not the modern-day approach to professional learning.