Ysgol Cwm Brombil

Highlights from Latest Inspection

Leaders and staff at Ysgol Cwm Brombil have successfully created a caring, inclusive community that ensures that nearly all pupils feel safe in schools and are supported to develop their mental and physical health. Leaders and governors have effectively managed the change to the new school and established a clear vision based on increasing aspiration, creating a sense of belonging and developing pupils' character. A particular strength is leaders' focus on creating strong values, based on a belief in inclusivity and the need to address inequity.

Staff work in close partnership with families and communities and understand the specific social and economic challenges faced by their community. Staff and pupils are proud to be part of t...he school community and value the support that leaders provide. In lessons, many pupils make suitable progress in their learning and build appropriately on their prior knowledge and skills.

In a few instances, pupils make strong progress and are supported well by teachers through engaging and challenging activities. However, because of shortcomings in teaching, a minority of pupils across the school make limited progress in their learning. In these lessons, teachers provide too much support and do not have high enough expectations of what pupils can achieve.

In addition, unstructured or independent activities in the primary phase are not planned sufficiently. As a result, pupils in this phase do not always make sufficient progress when engaging with these tasks. The majority of teachers use questioning suitably to check pupils' understanding.

Only a few use their feedback to deepen and probe pupils' knowledge, understanding and skills. in addition, teachers do not always use their assessment information well enough to inform their planning and pupils' next steps in learning. The school provides a broad and balanced curriculum for pupils with suitable opportunities for them to develop an understanding of their local community, Wales and the wider world.

This curriculum offer is narrowed in Year 9 when pupils study fewer subjects. Whilst teachers are beginning to provide a few suitable opportunities for pupils to develop their literacy and numeracy and digital skills, the provision for the progressive development of pupils' skills at an early stage of development. Leaders in Ysgol Cwm Brombil have been successful in promoting a positive safeguarding culture.

Provision to support vulnerable pupils is strong. The attendance of pupils that are entitled to free school meals has improved notably since last year. The school provides a wide range of support for pupils with additional learning needs (ALN) and these pupils make sound progress from their starting points.

Whilst leaders have secured particularly high levels of well-being and care, they have not had enough impact on improving some important aspects of the school's work, such as the quality of teaching and the impact of leadership at all levels. Although they gather a wide range of suitable evidence to support their evaluations, they do not focus closely enough on the impact that teaching has on pupils' learning. As a result, leaders are too generous in their evaluation of teaching and learning and have not identified a few important weaknesses in middle and senior leadership.

Recommendations R1 Strengthen processes to evaluate and improve the quality of teaching, learning and leadership at all levels R2 Improve the quality of teaching so that pupils of all ages and abilities make consistent progress in their learning R3 Strengthen the provision for the progressive development of pupils' skills R4 Ensure that assessment, including feedback, informs teachers' planning and supports pupil progress