Future primary school building developments in Powys will focus on the “area school” model, an education chief has explained.

At a meeting of Powys County Council’s Learning and Skills scrutiny committee on 10 September, councillors and lay independent members received an update report on the capital budget performance for the first quarter of 2026/2027, from April to the end of June.

The council has just under £129m to use on capital schemes this year, which means investing in new buildings as well as maintaining buildings and infrastructure.

Of this sum, £40.2m has been allocated to education, with £11.35m used during the first quarter.

The report provides an update on how several new school building projects are progressing.

Longer term, the council has a rolling list of pipeline school building projects.

Head of Transforming Schools Marianne Evans told the committee that they will soon get the opportunity to review the Strategic Outline Programme for school building projects from the Welsh Government’s Sustainable Communities for Learning programme.

The government has asked all councils to review their lists and Ms Evans said that the updated SOP will go before the cabinet later this year.

Ms Evans said: “We have mapped out the pupil projections for the next 10 years and matched it with housing development.

“We know the capacity of our schools, their condition and where the need is.”

“In the current SOP there is reference to area primary schools linked to catchment reviews.

“We will need to look at that as a key strategy for our primary schools.”

The problem, she explained, is that as primary schools are closed, the primary schools designated to absorb the new pupils are filling up.

Ms Evans said: “The answer is merging three, four or five schools together and see if we can build an area school.”