A “radical and ambitious” overhaul of sixth forms in Powys will be unveiled later this year, an education chief has said, with the county suffering from a ‘brain drain’ with hundreds of teenagers leaving the county each day to follow further education courses elsewhere.

At a meeting of Powys County Council’s Finance Panel on 31 January, councillors were told that this year Powys schools received around £4 million from the Welsh Government to teach sixth formers.

Welsh Government funding for post-16 education follows the student and it will be given to the institution they are studying at.

This means that Powys schools miss out when pupils opt to study elsewhere after their GCSEs.

The last time figures on the topic were given to councillors was back in 2020.

At the time they were told that an estimated 500 youngsters from Powys were leaving the county daily to continue their education in Shrewsbury, Hereford, Cheshire, Denbighshire, Neath Port Talbot, and elsewhere.

Between 2010 and 2019, the number of pupils in Powys sixth forms dropped from 1,445 to 978.

Correspondingly funding from the Welsh Government based on pupils numbers for this period dropped from £6.5 million to £4.4 million.

Cllr Jeremy Pugh said: “Post 16 education is our biggest challenge.

“We need to grasp the nettle; we’re still no further on than we were six or seven years ago.”

Head of schools transformation Marianne Evans told the committee that a “strategic review” of Post-16 education in the county is being conducted.

Ms Evans said: “It is time to take some courageous ambitious steps with our post-16, we have not taken decisions when we should have.

“We can’t cut any further, it’s death by 1,000 cuts in our schools and sixth forms.

“It’s an opportunity to do something radical and ambitious.”