Analysis: Is the performance of Scottish school pupils improving or deteriorating?

Two sets of statistics offer conflicting verdicts on the state of Scottish education

They say a week is a long time in politics, but it has nothing on Scottish education.

It was only on Tuesday last week that pupils from Scotland were found to have recorded their worst ever performances in maths, science and reading in tests held in 81 countries by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).

The results of the Programme for International Student Assessment (Pisa) study were met with dismay by the majority of commentators, many of whom suggested that it confirmed the implementation of Scotland’s Curriculum for Excellence, introduced since 2010, had been a failure.

Education Secretary Jenny Gilruth chats to pupils during a visit to Craigmount High School in Edinburgh to mark SQA Results Day 2023. Andrew Milligan/PA Wire

Fast-forward seven days, however, and new data now appears to show the opposite is actually true.

A “record high” performance for literacy and numeracy was found in the Achievement of Curriculum for Excellence Levels (Acel) for 2022/23.

Clearly, there is a fairly glaring contradiction between the two sets of statistics in terms of the verdict they offer on the state of Scottish education.

Part of the reason for this is that they are completely different measurements, of different age groups.

GLASGOW, UNITED KINGDOM - FEBRUARY 05: Pupils at Williamwood High School sit prelim exams on February 5, 2010 in Glasgow, Scotland As the UK gears up for one of the most hotly contested general elections in recent history it is expected that that the economy, immigration, the NHS and education are likely to form the basis of many of the debates. (Photo by Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)

Pisa is a computer-based test of a representative sample of 15-year-olds in countries across the OECD every three years.

It is not without its critics, but is generally considered the gold standard. In fact, the Scottish Government’s Acel report describes Pisa as “a key international benchmark of performance”.

The OECD did not offer the same compliment of Acel in its 2021 report on Curriculum for Excellence, which said: “Reporting on the levels has its limitations, given that they were designed to support teacher planning and judgement and not to measure national progress.

"Small changes in data of this kind cannot give the system the intelligence it needs to monitor the achievement of particular groups of students within the cohort.”

Unlike Pisa, the Acel data is produced for several age groups – those in P1, P4, P7 and S3.

Crucially, it is also based on teacher judgements on pupil performance, although this is informed by Scottish National Standardised Assessments.

First Minister Humza Yousaf took to social media on Tuesday to hail Acel as “the most up to date and comprehensive data on attainment”.

It is the case that the most recent Pisa tests were carried out in 2022, whereas Acel results were submitted to the Government by councils in the summer this year.

However, Edinburgh University emeritus professor Lindsay Paterson described Acel as akin to “the education system's marking its own homework”.

Education Secretary Jenny Gilruth suggested this was a positive, declaring in Holyrood: “I do trust Scotland’s teachers to tell us where our young people are in terms of their progress”.

She also cautioned that the Pisa dataset should not be “read in isolation”.

This is true, which is why so many people criticised the Scottish Government’s decision in 2010 to quit two other international studies, known as the Trends in International Mathematics and Science (Timss) and Progress in International Reading Literacy (Pirls).

Mr Yousaf and Ms Gilruth committed to re-join both schemes earlier this year, but it will be 2026 before Scotland’s performance in those tests are released.

That is a long time in Scottish education.