Meeting of the Parliament (Hybrid) 03 June 2021
I do not think that promoting the opportunity for individual tutoring after a pandemic has affected many individuals in different ways is dictating something that would be unwelcome by most schools and most young people.
If the answer is that the education secretary has no additional plans, parents and pupils across Scotland will be owed an explanation as to why no meaningful action is being taken to help recover those 16 weeks of lost classroom learning.
In closing, I return to what is, for me, the most important point. Further decline and stagnation are not inevitable. There is no reason to believe that all is lost, but after 14 years of SNP failure, we do not have any more time to waste. Every young person deserves the gold standard education for which Scotland was once famous, and until the SNP owns its mistakes, rather than trying to excuse them away, progress will be slow.
At the moment, teachers, learners, parents, and carers are being asked to pick up the slack. That is not good enough, and it is time for the Government to act. Reversing the decision to allow grades to be downgraded on appeal and axing—not reforming—failing education bodies such as the SQA, will send a strong message that the Government is in listening mode and ready to reset and rebuild trust. Inaction will simply confirm more of the same and reinforce the cosy arrangement that is at the heart of this SNP Government that lets everyone off the hook.
We will find out in pretty short order whether the education secretary is John Swinney 2.0 or if she is serious about making the hard choices that are needed to improve the life chances of our young people. For the sake of Scotland’s pupils, parents, and teachers, and for the future of our country, we must all hope that it is the latter.
I move amendment S6M-00204.2, to leave out from “and parents have faced” to end and insert:
“, parents, families and carers have faced over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic; commends the extraordinary work done by university, college, school, nursery and childcare staff over the last year to maintain education and childcare; notes, by way of contrast, the absence of meaningful and timely support from the Scottish Government and its education agencies and the pressure and anxiety that this has caused; recognises that there were significant challenges in Scottish education before the pandemic as a result of the First Minister’s broken promise to make education the number one priority, and calls on the Scottish Government to act with more urgency to reverse damaging cuts to teacher numbers, to bring all classrooms up to an acceptable standard and reduce class sizes, to put in place catch-up plans, including a tutoring scheme to make up for lost learning, to address the shortfall in college funding and to set out plans to enable in-person, small group learning at universities in order to prevent a generation of young people being lost to COVID-19.”
14:31Motions, questions or amendments mentioned by their reference code.
- S6M-00204.2 Education Motion