Edinburgh pupils continue to outperform rivals in other regions

Published on Thursday 26 November 2009 08:37

PUPILS in Edinburgh's schools are widening their gap on the rest of Scotland after once again outperforming the national average in this year's SQA exams, new figures reveal.

Youngsters who sat their exams in May have also surpassed Edinburgh's results from the previous year, with those who took Advanced Highers gaining the best marks in six years.

A total of 12 per cent of pupils gained five Highers by the end of S5, compared with a Scottish average of 10 per cent.

But while the improvements have been welcomed by education chiefs, the figures highlight a stark contrast between schools in the city's more affluent areas and those in deprived communities.

So the best performing schools include Boroughmuir in Viewforth, St Thomas of Aquin's in Lauriston, James Gillespie's in Marchmont and The Royal High in Barnton – all affluent areas.

But the schools which had the fewest amount of pupils achieving passes include Wester Hailes Education Centre – which saw no pupils pass either five Highers by the end of S5 or any passes at Advanced Higher level – and Craigroyston Community High School in Muirhouse, which had no pupils achieve five Highers by the end of S5 and just four per cent of pupils achieving a pass at Advanced Higher level.

Jeremy Balfour, education spokesman for the Conservatives, said: "It's good news that there's been an improvement and we need to work on that and congratulate teachers and pupils in that success. We have to be careful that we don't become a divided city and we need to continue to help every school achieve the best results they can."

Today's figures show those gaining five Higher passes by the end of S6 have also beaten the Scottish average, with 23 per cent of pupils in Edinburgh achieving the result, compared with 20 per cent nationally.

The Advanced Higher pass rate was well above average, with 17 per cent of youngsters gaining at least one pass, compared with 13 per cent nationally. More than a fifth of city secondary schools exceeded last year's results in both the number of pupils passing five Highers at the end of S5 and the number achieving one pass at Advanced Higher level.

City education leader Councillor Marilyne MacLaren said: "Edinburgh has an education service to be proud of and these results give a clear sign that our schools and our pupils are succeeding.

"The city's schools have made huge progress and this recent success is the result of hard work from pupils, teachers and those behind the scenes. I'm confident we can continue to improve as we target support to the schools that really need it to help them tackle the very specific challenges they face."

The gulf between schools at the top and the bottom of the league table follows the same trend as pupils in the early years of high school, as the Evening News reported earlier this month.

While more pupils meet basic standards in reading, writing and maths by age 14, a number of schools still struggle to get children up to the minimum levels of reading, writing and maths.

In over a quarter of the city's 23 high schools, at least half of children aged 14 are not meeting basic targets in writing and maths.

The latest attainment report, produced by the city council, revealed that the three worst performing secondary schools this year were Castlebrae in Craigmillar, Wester Hailes Education Centre (WHEC) and Craigroyston.

However, Castlebrae and WHEC have made significant improvements. And although attainment in Craigroyston has decreased in reading and writing, it has seen a 12 per cent increase in its maths results.