Leader: Parents deserve to have facts on the table

TODAY we carry tables showing the performance in terms of examination results of most of Scotland’s schools.

The process of constructing these tables is laborious and time-consuming, as the Scottish Government makes it very difficult to do, publishing data only for individual schools. The SNP, like its Labour/Lib Dem predecessors, dislikes figures being turned into “league tables”. In this, the politicians are out of touch with parents, the consumers of education, who will scour these tables to find out how their child’s school is doing.

In arguing against league tables, it is claimed unfair comparisons will be made between schools in well-off areas and those with catchments blighted by poverty. Such an argument is spurious. Parents are not stupid and should not be patronised. They know affluence and poverty contribute to a schools performance.

However, these tables allow parents to compare like with like. Using the proportion of children on free school meals as a rough indicator of social background, some schools in “poor” areas do better than others. Similarly the performance of schools in “good” areas vary. If we are serious about giving all our children the best of education, and the best start in life, we should start by asking why there are these variations.