SNP slammed by Fraser for education standards in Scotland

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The SNP has long been accused of focusing on the ongoing bid for independence rather than more domestic issues, including education. This week, an independent review from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) found that the Scottish education system has now fallen behind best practice and has no long-term strategy, claiming instead that it was overcomplicated. The findings were readily accepted by the Scottish Education Secretary Shirley-Anne Somerville, and Scotland’s exam agency and schools inspections will soon be reformed as a result.

But, the report was published after the SNP’s opponents accused the Scottish government of withholding the findings due to the severity of its criticisms until after May’s election.

The damning report found there was not enough data to assess schools’ performances, teachers did not spend long enough developing lessons and spent too much teaching, and there was no clear leadership on developing the curriculum.

Ahead of the report’s publication, journalist Madeleine Kearns claimed: “The despair felt by Scottish teachers is a notable shift from the anger I encountered in the staffroom when I trained among them five years ago.”

She was referring to Scotland’s poor performance in reading, maths and science in the leading education rankings, Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), which supposedly left professors at top Scottish universities “reeling”.

At the time, Professor emeritus of education at the University of Dundee, Keith Topping said: “I don’t think it’s a lost cause, but the clock is ticking.”

Speaking to tes.com, a UK outlet for education professionals back in 2015, he claimed that the Curriculum of Excellence (CfE) — which was created for the Scottish education system for ages three to 18 in 2002 — had a limited amount of time left.

Professor Topping said: “You can’t expect any curricular initiative to have a shelf life of longer than 20 years.

“If you don’t get it right in the next five years, forget it.”

Also in 2015, Professor Lindsay Paterson from the University of Edinburgh said it was clear the CfE was “failing” and that the Pisa results made up the worst news for Scottish education for his entire 30-year career.

He asked: “What else has been as much of a shock to Scottish complacency as this announcement?”

The SNP’s then education secretary John Swinney did pledge to introduce “radical” reforms in response — but the OECD report has now suggested these promises did not help matters.

At the time, Mr Swinney vowed reforms were already underway and new standardised national assessments were to start in 2017 and 2018.

Yet, in the academic year of 2019 to 2020, students passing with three or more Highers was 43 percent lower than any other year after 2015, while independent watchdog Audit Scotland pointed out that any progress “falls short of the Scottish government’s aims”.

Mr Swinney maintained that there were slight improvements in Pisa figures in 2019, but writing in The Spectator, Ms Kearns noted that the attainment gap between wealthy and poor students was still large.

She also pointed out that the SNP had pulled Scotland out of two major international maths, science and literacy surveys, Timss and Pirls, in 2010, and in 2017, discontinued another called SSLN.

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She alleged: “The SNP’s preferred metric is continuous assessment, which they largely make up as they go along.”

Like many countries, the Scottish education system struggled throughout the pandemic.

But Mr Swinney was even forced to upgrade 75,000 students’ exam results after the SQA downgraded their marks last year after widespread outcry.

Students now rely on assessments, as end-of-year exams were cancelled again.

As Ms Kearns noted, Mr Swinney chose not to release the report until after the May election for the Scottish Parliament, which saw the SNP fall just one seat short of a majority.

She claimed: “Those responsible for this mess ought to answer for it at the ballot box.”

The new OECD report recommended scrapping the Scottish Qualifications Authority — which oversees exam grading — and replacing it with a new agency, while also stripping Education Scotland, which carries out school inspections.

The exam and qualification system could be changed, too.

Notably, Ross Greer, an MSP for the Scottish Greens, also slammed the government over the report — even though the SNP informally rely on the party to maintain their majority of pro-independence MSPs in Holyrood.

He said: “It’s a failure of the government that the exams system was left largely untouched when the new curriculum was introduced a decade ago.

“As a result, completely unnecessary barriers have been put in the way of hundreds of thousands of pupils.”

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