Chamber and committees

I will look at the OECD report in its entirety. My officials and I have not only read the executive summary and recommendations; we have read the report, substantial as it is, so of course I have looked at every aspect of it. As I said in my previous answer, as we respond in full to the OECD review, I will challenge myself and we will challenge ourselves about whether more needs to be done on data to ensure that people have confidence in what is collected and that it is done in the right way.

We must be clear about what the OECD report said on standardised assessments. As I said at the start, standardised assessments do not judge the totality of curriculum for excellence. That was never their point. It is not what they were designed to do and, therefore, it is not surprising that they do not do that.

That has been discussed at great length in what is now the NQ22 group. Clearly, there were understandable concerns about the workload pressures that the alternative certification model presented to staff last year. We are not in that circumstance this year, as we are not doing the alternative certification model.

The key point that has been looked at, and on which a discussion is taking place, is about what the contingencies are, and a reassurance that no additional assessments will be required that teachers will have to carry out. That is a very important reassurance for teachers because, as I have said, they are still in the middle of dealing with the pandemic. The Government and the SQA were very keen to ensure that we took cognisance of the impact that decisions would have on teacher workload.

You will forgive me if I do not say too much about the refresh of the attainment challenge, as I will be making further announcements on that in due course. However, I can reassure the committee that the empowerment of schools to make decisions will remain very much at the heart of that, because they know their communities best and how best to use the PEF funding to support children and young people.

One of the challenges that the Government faces as we look to tackle the poverty-related attainment gap is that, despite the fact that we can do so much in education and despite our determination to do so, the issue of child poverty has to be tackled, too. I am working very closely with my colleague Shona Robison to see what we can do in our portfolios in that respect. The UK Government has, of course, taken away the equivalent of the Scottish child payment through its cut to universal credit, which will inevitably impact on children and families throughout the country and, in turn, impact on their preparations for school. The Government can do what it can to support children and young people through, for example, the school clothing grant and free school meals, but it does not help when another hand takes away part of our support.

The OECD has not said that the SQA is not fit for purpose. We need to be very careful about putting words into the mouth of the OECD—that is not a comfortable position for anyone in Parliament to take. The OECD has pointed out that we can look to having a different type of organisation in place that deals with curriculum and assessment. That is exactly the recommendation that I have looked at and acted on.

In the meantime, while the work carries on, through the Ken Muir report on what will replace the SQA and any reforms for Education Scotland, both Education Scotland and the SQA have important roles to play. It is exceptionally important that the SQA carries on that work to ensure that we have a credible and fair exams and assessment system next year. I have full confidence that the SQA will continue to do that, and I have full confidence in the SQA.

In many ways, that question goes back to my earlier answers to Willie Rennie about what information is collated. Part of that is the curriculum for excellence levels data, which we gather in order to assess young people’s progression through the levels. It is very important to look at what has been learned over that period, and the data is there. It is also important to look at the health and wellbeing of young people through that process. In December, there will be another survey on health and wellbeing, so that we can assure ourselves about where we are on that aspect. Of course, we expect the Government to keep a close eye on that not just because of the pandemic but generally. The national improvement framework interactive evidence report provides an overview of what we know about education and the context of young people’s progress, so that is being looked at.

Work is also under way to gather additional evidence for the 2022 national improvement framework from the lockdown lowdown survey as well as from surveys of headteachers and from the health and wellbeing census of pupils from P5 to S6.

That is why we are assessing it.

Ensuring the credibility of the process is important. The past two years have been like no others that we could have imagined or planned for when it came to what happened with the exams.

I made a point earlier about the professional judgment of our teachers. That has come to the fore over the past few years, proving that there are different ways of carrying out an assessment process that can lead to a qualification that is still credible.

Members do not have to take my word for it—or even the word of the SQA, even though one of its guiding principles is to ensure the credibility of the process and even though it works exceptionally hard to allow that to happen. We need only look at how the process was received by employers. I was heartened by a letter led by Sandy Begbie and signed by many other employers that credited our children and young people for going through what might have been a different process and facing challenges that none of the rest of us had to face when we were going through our exams—no matter how long ago that was—and which made it clear that employers had faith in what young people received at the end of the day.

Again, I pay tribute to the university sector, which worked in an exceptionally close way with Government and the SQA to understand the process and, as a result, to have faith in it when it came to entry requirements. The reaction of both universities and employers demonstrates the credibility of the approach that has been taken in the past couple of years and the fact that there are different ways of having a credible assessment system.

You are correct to say that that is a bit of a left-field question, Mr Ewing, but I shall do my best to answer it.

You have raised an important point about the use of technology. However, this is not just about having a device, and I will broaden things out slightly to talk about connectivity, which is important, too. I am being reassured that the experiences and outcomes include the use of technology. They may not go as far as Mr Ewing wishes on touch typing, but I hope that I have given him as much reassurance as I can that the use of technology is in the technologies Es and Os.

Some of the areas of skills shortage are not in highly paid jobs. One way to attract people to work in social care would be by having a fairer work policy and a better standard of pay. The health secretary made announcements on that yesterday. Some aspects of employment and fair work are reserved to Westminster. We face challenges with some areas of low-paid work—some sectors are not attractive because of the wages that are offered. It might help if the real living wage was more substantial.

In other areas, the challenge is to skill people up. During the pandemic, we looked at micro-credential courses and we are interested to see what more can be done with those. They might allow people to move from one sector to another or to upskill, which would support the need for skills across the economy. When we look at the national transition training fund, we are assessing how successful those micro-credential courses have been and whether they have allowed for upskilling or have helped people to change careers. It is important to assess what we are doing.

I take that issue exceptionally seriously. We expect the equalities duties to be taken seriously and undertaken thoroughly across our agencies. I last spoke to the SQA’s chief examiner on Monday this week to discuss the issue and to again be reassured by her about the work that is now in place to ensure that everything that needs to be done on the issue is being done. I am reassured that all the required equality impact assessments in relation to the awarding of national qualifications over the past two years were completed and have been published. That is in addition to those that were published by the Scottish Government. Clearly, there has been substandard practice in years gone by. That has been recognised, and those historical policies are being looked at and actioned.