Analysis: Three good reasons why standards aren’t falling

Whenever pass rates rise, people ask if standards are falling. There is no evidence to believe declining standards account for much, if any, of this year’s improvement in Highers passes.

Whenever pass rates rise, people ask if standards are falling. There is no evidence to believe declining standards account for much, if any, of this year’s improvement in Highers passes.

There are three more convincing explanations for the rise in pass rates. The first is a steady, incremental improvement in learning and teaching. Second, parents are better educated than ever before, and the level of parental education is one of the strongest influences on school success. Indeed, the influence of parental background on school success largely explains another message from today’s news – that results are better in private schools. Third, as each new qualification beds down, teachers become better at preparing their students for its particular styles of assessment. Curriculum for Excellence will change things, of course. It will introduce new modes of assessment and certification, but more for the new National 4 and 5 than for Highers. It will broaden the curriculum, change standards and thereby make comparisons over time more difficult.

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Most importantly, it could change the ways in which qualifications are combined within student programmes. Potentially, the 15-18 “senior phase” could become a much more diverse stage of education in which students combine subjects, levels and modes of study over the three years much more flexibly than at present. This could have enormous educational benefits and prepare students much better for university, college or workplace. Whether it will happen depends in large part on universities: will they demand “five Highers in S5” or will they reward the new flexibility? The long-term solution may be to wrap senior phase qualifications up in a broad-based European-style Baccalaureate – rather than the existing subject-specific Scottish one. And that would add a whole new dimension to the annual debate about standards.

• David Raffe is a professor at Edinburgh University’s Centre for Educational Sociology.

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