Do Youngsters in Powys Secondary Schools Have Worse Exam Results When Taught by Supply Teachers?

DO youngsters in Powys secondary schools have worse exam results if they are being taught by supply teachers?
This issue was discussed at a meeting of Powys County Council’s Learning and Skills Committee on Thursday, October 15, as councillors and an independent lay member went through a performance report that looked at how services had been delivered against a number of targets.
These targets are contained in the Corporate and Strategic Equality Plan 2023–2027 update report for quarter one of 2026/2027, which covers April to the end of June.
Several of the measures in the report were around education and schools.
Cllr Angela Davies (Liberal Democrat – Rhayader) brought up an overall measure on council staff sickness, which would include schools.
Measure 203 explains that during the quarter, the sickness rate was 2.69 days per full-time employee, when the target is two.
Cllr Davies asked: “What is the impact of sickness on schools and the services, and what are the issues?
“I would imagine if you’re in a school with children there’s a lot of bugs going around.
“Is there any link to wellbeing? I have raised issues in the past about the resilience of our staff and burnout because of stress levels due to the workload.”
Interim head of people services Gemma Gabriel said that Powys had the lowest sickness absence rates of all 22 local authorities in Wales over the last couple of years, but the rate had been going up over the last five quarters.
She added that the council was seeing an increase in anxiety and stress being given as reasons for sickness absence, but this was “across the whole council”.
Cllr Davies replied: “So you don’t really know at the moment.
“My concern is the cost to schools because getting stand-in staff at short notice is really expensive.
“The cost is not just financial but pupil attainment, and if their regular teacher is absent then there must surely be an impact.
“I imagine it would be very difficult to find a supply teacher at short notice who is a subject specialist. The impact on those pupils’ learning must be greater.”
She asked if the council had any information on how this would affect pupils facing their exams.
Director of education Dr Richard Jones said that it was “difficult to closely map” the use of supply teachers with pupil attainment levels.
Dr Jones said: “But what we are clear on is that when they (pupils) are not having their normal teacher, in very rare cases do they get the same quality provision that they get from a teacher who is permanently in front of them, who knows their needs.”
Cllr Lauren D’Silva (Liberal Democrat – Llandrindod South) asked whether, during periods when teachers were off sick long-term, schools had the “ability to match the best supply teacher” with the relevant specialism.
“As it would make a massive difference during exam years,” said Cllr D’Silva.
Head of school improvement and learning Sally Llewelyn answered: “Often when a specialist teacher of an examination class is unwell, secondary schools would deploy their staffing differently, with an internal reshuffle to make sure that a specialist is in front of the learners with the exam classes wherever possible.”
But this would have a “knock-on effect” further down the school.
Ms Llewelyn explained: “So having the pool of known supply teachers to come in where appropriate is very important.
“A lot of our secondary schools appoint permanent cover supervisors as a full-time member of staff.”
These staff would be “deployed” to cover classes when the usual teacher was absent.
“While they may not be a specialist, they are known to the children and have a relationship with them, so the class is not being picked up by a stranger,” said Ms Llewelyn.
Recommendations and comments from the committee will be provided to cabinet. ‌​‌​‌​​​‍‌​‌​​‌‌‌‍‌​‌‌​​‌​‍‌​‌‌‌​‌‌‍‌​‌‌‌‌​​

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By BBC LDRS ‌​‌​‌​​​‍‌​‌​​‌‌‌‍‌​‌‌​​‌​‍‌​‌‌‌​‌‌‍‌​‌‌‌‌​​