Thank you very much, convener. I am delighted to be able to provide the committee with an update on curriculum for excellence and the new national qualifications on what has been for many of those in Scottish education their hardest working year.
I will start with a few reflections on the curriculum for excellence journey that we have undertaken. First, I remind members of the fact that curriculum for excellence would not have been devised in the first place without the work of this committee’s predecessor. In 2003, the then Education, Culture and Sport Committee took a long, hard look at Scotland’s supposed educational primacy. It accepted, difficult as that was, that our so-called gold-standard system was somewhat tarnished. I pay tribute to that committee, particularly its convener, Karen Gillon, who was the driving force behind that inquiry.
I had the great privilege of serving on that committee. Its report was among the most ambitious that the Parliament has ever produced, and it was the foundation stone for curriculum for excellence. The report set out 10 objectives for Scottish education for the next two decades. It is instructive to look back at those objectives and to see all the work that has gone on to address them. I have asked my officials to submit a copy of the committee’s report as part of my evidence. I have also brought along with me as part of the evidence a short film made for the Scottish learning festival, and I have copies for each member. That makes the point about the progress that Scottish education has made and the work that is being undertaken.
We are in a much stronger position today than we were in 2003. We have record exam results, record high number of school leavers in positive destinations, more new or refurbished schools and the lowest teacher unemployment in the United Kingdom. I pay tribute to my fellow committee members from that time, as well as to our four expert advisers—Sally Brown, the late Malcolm MacKenzie, Lindsay Paterson and Keir Bloomer—on whose evidence we drew.
From the outset, curriculum for excellence was that rare thing—a groundbreaking policy that had the support of all political parties. I recognise the role of the party spokespersons who have contributed to the success of the policy in my time as education secretary: Murdo Fraser, Liz Smith, Des McNulty, Hugh Henry, Ken Macintosh, Margaret Smith and, now, Mary Scanlon, Liam McArthur, Patrick Harvie and Kezia Dugdale. The approach has been constructive and collegiate. Although we have differed on many issues, it is really important that we continue together to support curriculum for excellence and Scottish education.
When I become education secretary in December 2009, I had my own questions about whether we were going to succeed with such a hugely ambitious programme. Yet, I have seen—at all times and in every school that I have visited throughout Scotland—a tremendous enthusiasm for the new curriculum and the work that has gone into making the policy happen, including the work of Fiona Hyslop, my predecessor.
The curriculum for excellence has provided us with the best possible long-term plan for how we do education in Scotland. Indeed, that was the whole point of CFE, and it was what the committee’s predecessor envisaged. It is a process, not an event. It has been going on for a considerable period of time; it will continue to go on; and we will learn as we move forward.
This year’s exam diet was a major milestone for CFE and was, by any measure, a success. There is a general feeling that teachers who had worked exceptionally hard had come through it and learned from it, difficult as it was for some. As the committee knows, I invited the curriculum for excellence management board to reflect on the implementation of the new qualifications, and I welcomed the publication of its report in August.
We will continue to support teachers in delivering the new qualifications. However, as Ken Muir told the committee last week, it is the responsibility of everyone in the system to reduce overassessment. For example, far more pupils were assessed for the national 4 added value unit than was necessary, and a practical lesson that we have learned is that, with the introduction of these qualifications, there was a degree of overassessment. We can begin to withdraw from that and continue to develop the system.
We will make further refinements based on what the data tells us. As you will know, I have asked the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development to report in 2015 on curriculum for excellence’s impact; that work is going to be supported by the Royal Society of Edinburgh’s education committee, and we will look closely at what it tells us.
We are also supporting teachers in their professional development. The new Scottish College for Educational Leadership is now up and running with a new chief executive, a new website and a new fellowship programme. That will be crucial to all teachers.
Some years ago, I had the pleasure of meeting the German federal secretary for education. Over lunch, he joked that, when he met other education ministers, he was always able to spot those who were involved in introducing new curriculums, as they were the most worried-looking of all. There have been moments of worry over the past five years, but worry is—like effort, hard work and collaboration—a normal part of human life. All of those things have paid off, and they will go on paying dividends for our young people.
There is an unstoppable momentum in our schools and a huge enthusiasm among teachers and pupils to keep on learning and improving. With every milestone that we reach—and we have just reached one—we are changing the culture of Scottish education and are getting closer to realising that gold-standard curriculum that we had, that we wanted to get back, that we envisaged getting back 11 years ago in the predecessor committee’s report and which we are now getting back.
Of course, I welcome questions from the committee on these and no doubt many other points.