WT Actual F has happened to Scottish education under the SNP???

[YellowPixie]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cm2vk9gm4e0o

Analysis has been done into the pass rates of SQA exams, looking at the total cohort of S4 pupils and Nat 5s, rather than just the ones entered in the exams.

Only 40% of S4 kids passed Nat 5 maths. 25% have a pass in biology which they say is the most popular science. What a fucking shambles - no wonder they want to scrap Nat 5s, they can then pretend that everyone's a winner and give all S4s an "achievement certificate" irrespective of whether or not they would know a fraction if it came up and slapped them.

If they get rid of exams it will be a travesty. They probably will give uni places out on the basis of some deprivation index rather than ability. What a disaster the SNP are.

I'm by no means defending the Scottish Govt but the figures in that article are a bit misleading.
Not all kids sit Nat 5 in S4. Many will take it in S5 and/or S6. The pass rate in maths Nat 5 is actually about 68% or something like that for those who do sit it.
What they should really be doing is bringing back arithmetic as an option for those who will always struggle with pure mathematics.
Maths Applications is not arithmetic so not really a viable alterative. Many more kids would leave school with a numeracy based qualification if standard arithmetic was an option I think. Far more useful in life too.

The SNP’s destruction of the Scottish education system is the main reason we left Scotland - couldn’t watch our DC being failed by the system, the council or their respective schools any longer. Absolute shambles. (And to think I spent 20 years living in Scotland being told that their education system was the best in the UK - what a joke)

Some of the unis already have a target to reach for offers made to MD20&40 applicants. Something like 25% of offers to this population under a widening access policy. It would be interesting to know what sorts of grades students from different SIMD areas have.

Widening access offers tend to be not that much lower. Have a look at Uni websites and compare standard entry and minimum entry tariffs.
Medicine at Glasgow as an example only has a single grade difference in one of the five Highers. Same grades at Advanced H for both standard and widening access entry.

You don’t think that having lots of pupils academically incapable of passing nat5 maths in S4 is an issue???

If they are not capable of passing it then it is legitimate to treat it as a fail in nat5 maths.

I have a child doing modern studies. They seem to be taught very little actual knowledge but just how to structure the answer that the marker is marking to. Is this not the entire issue with CfE? They are being taught anything big actual academic knowledge. CfE, the inclusion policy and the banning of permanent exclusions all needs to be binned. They are the OPPOSITE of progress. But that would mean the SNP admitting it’s shite so it won’t happen and kids will go on being totally and utterly failed until grown ups take over, which will hopefully be after the next Holyrood election..

Very small sample size but my son is in s4 and has just done his prelims. He is in the top. Maths class out of 6 classes. Less than half his class passed the prelim. I am shocked at how low the pass rates are. He got straight As for prelims so it's not like it can't be done. He works hard ish but is by no means unusually academic. English results seemed much better.

I have a s5 child who did nat5 last year, it’s not about understanding the subject. Business, modern studies was all about learning the command words and regurgitating in the expected format, modern languages about rote learning and regurgitating, same with science. At his s5 parents evening his geography teacher said it didn’t matter if he didn’t understand the topic, he just needed to learn it off by heart and regurgitate.

I was confused about how it was possible to get such high marks for arts/social subjects then I realised that for a (say) 4 mark question, you just have to provide 4 vaguely relevant points and there is no distinction made between how good the points points are - so an answer with 4 “ok” relevant points will get the same marks as one with 4 “excellent” relevant points. Not qualitative distinction applied.

I also have a nearly 5 year old with Complex needs and disabilities....dont even begin to imagine how the schooling system will treat him

The course work is ridiculous now as well -
do it, write it all out at home and then get an hour to regurgitate it as well as possible in an hour in class in pseudo-exam conditions. I have no idea if all schools are doing this in the same way and the approach seems to be so similar to an exam that I’m not sure why they are bothering with it. Has to be done like this because of AI apparently.

I did O Grades and there was the option just to did Arithmetic and not Maths. I gather standard grade could be done at different levels (my year was during a transition period where we started standard grades then went back to O Grades). So I suppose it’s always been a system with different levels but 40% does seem spectacularly shit.

i have found the schools focus to be on teaching kids to pass exams rather than teaching them their subject well enough to understand and answer exam questions. Maybe this is what happens when a focus is put on results and standards of behaviours and social issues are impacting teacher’s abilities to actually teach as they’re having to fire-fight and manage kids with ASN and downright awful behaviours.

To be honest though, the school system is broken and a focus on lifelong learning should be supported and kids should be given life skills and critical thinking as well as issues about mental health and well-being, relationships and parenting etc.

Exactly this! It’s not what you write it’s the structure you use for your answer. If that’s not total nonsense I don’t know what is!

School shouldn’t be about parenting and well being etc, that’s for your family and GP and social services etc not school or teachers! school standards are falling because schools are expected to do these things at the same time as teaching and it’s not working.

This. It's appalling.

Every single party at Holyrood supported the implementation of CfE after 'The Big Listen' exercise in the early 00s.

The comparison should be the pass rate of Standard Grade Credit and Nat 5 although I understand Nat 5 is harder than Credit was.

Exams were always about regurgitating the answers even when I sat Highers (some revised and some not) in the mid 90s. Pupils are at least taught exam skills now.

There are scads of issues of issues in Scottish education. The CfE is one of them. I have applied to be part of the Primary Curriculum Review and I'll be heading in with my 5-14 documents...

Yep. I was so shocked by this, it's not about content or context it is literally about saying four things for a four point question.

I did Modern Studies at Standard Grade and ever since then had encouraged everyone to take it. Such an important subject. No more, after pushing my own DS to take it.

To be crystal clear - no blame on the teachers for this at all.

I have found my people.

DD has just sat her Nat 5 prelims. The standard of education at her school is dire, the curriculum she has to learn is worse and I’m so disappointed for her.

Shes not academic really but in ‘top set’ in all her subjects.

We are three hours drive at least to the nearest private school and I’m seriously considering it as an option for S5 given the mess of the past few weeks.

I don’t think the private schools are any different (we have loads around our way so know lots of private school kids/parents of). I know they sometimes do GCSE/A levels for some subjects depending on the school but where they are doing Scottish exams it seems to be just the same with if anything a bit more reinforcement on the rote learning.

Chemistry is the biggest problem in our house. The notes are spread across Teams and jotters and it’s hard to know what goes with what. The notes on Teams have blank spaces where the primary answers would be - these need to be written in a jotter separately during the lesson and DC2 says it’s hard to make it clear which Teams notes they match up with because the notes aren’t loaded on to Teams until a few days after the lesson (I’d advised headings and dates added in the relevant page in the jotter to match the Teams notes but it doesn’t seem to be that simple!). So it’s all a confusing mess, DC2 has been in tears and DC1’s advice is “just ignore the class notes, they’re hopeless, just use the Leckie book, that’s what I did”.

My dd has just sat her n5 prelims of the 5 results she's had back she has 4 As and completely failed her maths 13% on one paper, a few of her friends in the same top set also failed. I'm at a loss how she's getting straight As but is no where near any mark for maths.

I don’t even know where to start if I’m honest. All through S3 we were told things like ‘on-track’ and she’s doing brilliantly.

When I started to pull it apart, it’s a very different story. Most subjects have two teachers, work is spread across multiple platforms. I don’t think they will cover all of the syllabus in time for May. The maths prelim featured questions she hasn’t yet covered in class.

She’s on her 6th English teacher since the start of S3. Teacher didn’t have enough info at parent evening to say whether or not she had even met DD (she had but only for an hour).

What was made very clear was that poor teacher was picking up a top set that were in no way ready to sit a prelim, let alone an exam and haven’t done a stitch of coursework to be submitted.

The school just seems obsessed with getting the kids to sign up to ££££ trips. Lots of opportunities to head to Africa for two weeks for £5000 a time. Three days away with the History department? Not a problem that’s £900.
Croatia? Ten days? £2000.

DD keeps being taken aside and asked why she’s not signing up for any of these as they would ‘benefit her tremendously’. It’s all fake fundraising, as she has to raise funds herself.
I had words with the year head in the end. While also asking what English I had to cover with her at home and through a tutor we’ve now found her.

DD does plenty outside of school with sports, hobbies, sports trips and fundraising but that seems to count for nothing.

Scottish schools desperately need help, they need permanent teachers and a government to step up and help them get there through proper investment.

My kids are at a very good state school. One of the state schools which regularly tops the league tables and is named state secondary of the year. The kids are motivated and so are the teachers. But they are teaching exam technique not understanding of the subject in my cases. How to identify command words and structure your answer accordingly - what you actually SAY in that answer is secondary.

I don't blame the teachers for this at all, they are doing their best to secure the best grades possible for the kids and stand them in the best stead for applying to uni or getting a great job. But it must be super frusrtating as a French teacher to know that the kids can't actually express themselves or hold a conversation spontaneously because everything is pre-planned, written down, checked over, and then simply recited back to the teacher.

Yes there was a bit of this when I was at school but not to the same degree. We were taught essay structure and how to set out answers but it was not so formulaic, modern languages oral exams were unseen and unprepared, Something has gone very badly wrong if only 40% are achieving maths at the end of S4. 60% of Scottish children do not have additional needs. I get that schools don't present children if they are not up to it and I know one of DD's friends didn't get her Nat5 maths until the end of S6. I also think Apps is a good thing, I am old enough to be the last cohort which sat O Grades and we all did Arithmetic and Maths.

Also, after the shitshow which was the algorithm and predicted grades in 2020/21, there were noises about scrapping the SQA and replacing them (with a body probably staffed with all the same people and doing the same jobs but just with a different name) and it's all gone quiet on that front too.

The pass rate for the Nat 5 is meaningless if you don’t consider the whole cohort. It could be 100% if you only allow five brilliant students to sit it. The fact that some students passed after an additional two years of education is also a damning indictments of the education up to S4.

Also, after the shitshow which was the algorithm and predicted grades in 2020/21, there were noises about scrapping the SQA and replacing them (with a body probably staffed with all the same people and doing the same jobs but just with a different name) and it's all gone quiet on that front too.

This is happening this spring; Scottish Qualifications Authority is being replaced with Qualifications Scotland. Not sure if just a new name or a new organisation with all the current staff tupe’d across…