Fawr y maes ounweddol, rydyn ni gael i fod yn ddesgliadau'r 16 o ddysgwylurrol yn 2019. Os colleithio gwaith y trofodd o'r syniad mwy pension, the convener, Ross Greer, Oliver Mundell ac Tavish Scots sefydlu i'r ddysgwylurr. Rwy'n dechrau'r ddysguadau, i gael i ddysgwylur ar gyfer allan iddyn nhw i cadw anodol am gweithio i gwyll John mwy a adnog iddyn nhw i gael i gweithio'r 5 o gyfnodd y peth. First item of business is the fifth evidence session on the committee's subject choice inquiry. Today, we will hear from local authorities. I welcome to this meeting Jerry Lyons, representative of the Association of Directors of Education in Scotland, Dr Pauline Stephen, director of schools and learning at Angus Council, Tony McDade, executive director of education resources at South Lanarkshire Council, Dr Mark Ratter, head of education services, quality improvement and performance, East Renfrewshire Council and Vincent Docherty, head of education, Aberdeen Shire Council. We do not have to answer every question, so I will try to call you when you want to respond to a question. If members and witnesses can keep their comments focused, that means that we will get through the evidence. I think that that is really more a warning to me than any else in the committee. First of all, thank you all for being here and I am going to ask Jenny Gilruth to open the question. Thank you, convener, and good morning to the panel. I want to take you all back in time for the start this morning in terms of the development of the senior phase and your involvement in it. I know that having been a development officer at Education Scotland in around 2012-13, you remember there was a commitment secured with ADES to develop core support materials with the Government. Michael Russell was the cabinet secretary at the time, and it was core support material to support national four, five and higher. There was also a commitment secured to develop professional focus papers, which was about empowering the profession to understand the main exam changes for the new qualifications. However, I want to find out this morning what your involvement was in that development of the senior phase and what it looked like back in 2012-13. What was your organisation's respective involvement in that process? From the ADES perspective, ADES was involved with stakeholder groups and the groups that were having discussions about the development of the curriculum at that particular time. My understanding is that ADES was not directly involved in producing materials or developing resources. Education Scotland would potentially have been the agency that would have been most charged with that responsibility, but ADES was involved in the various stakeholder groups that existed at that particular time. At that particular time, I was a headteacher within our local authority, and I remember it quite well, in the sense that we worked together from a school's perspective and a local authority to try to shape some of the information that was coming out nationally to look at how that would look locally and to see how that would then translate into practice. Obviously, we were looking at the scale, the development from S1 right through, not just in terms of the broad general education but the kinds of qualifications that were coming on stream and what that might look like. I think that it was an involvement as a headteacher and indeed as a local authority trying to look at how best that might look as you were moving. I'll come back in a minute. Does anybody else in the panel want to respond from their experience? Also as a headteacher at the time, one of the interesting discussions that was taking place was the support materials that had been produced as part of higher still. You may have been familiar with them, the massive folders for every subject, and there was certainly a decision that having that bulk of paper and that amount of material prepared would not necessarily be the way forward. I do remember, as a headteacher, that it was very much about working with teachers to say what is the guidance that we've got, what are the experiences and outcomes, what are the course descriptors saying, and how do we develop that in a way that's of most value to our young people. It was a different model from that kind of get a course for everything. Given that concept of teacher agency, which has still been talked about now and when teachers develop, was very much my memory of what was happening at that point. I want to move on now to how the senior phase looks compared to how it perhaps looked five, ten years ago. In your submission, you said that it makes timetabling now much more flexible, and you said that prior to CFE, the S56 timetable catered mainly for the most able, concentrating on ensuring that higher and advanced higher courses could run. Now pupils in the senior phase can access courses at the time most appropriate to them. I wonder if the rest of the panel would agree with that assertion, because perhaps in the past, and certainly when I was at school, pupils were encouraged if they were not deemed to be academic enough to leave school at the end of S4. Would you say that, you know, Vincent's approach to this is the right one? I don't know if you want to respond to that yourself, Vincent. Yes, and I think firstly I'll say probably the words. It could be argued that that should have gone before the S5 and S6. I haven't been a headteacher myself in Maryhill for a number of years. I think that the point that is being made here is that the school that I was responsible for had less than 10 per cent of the youngsters in S5 and S6 achieving five hires, and I always would think that when we were doing the timetabling exercise, so why do we say that a timetabler starts with five different columns to ensure that the youngsters who are doing five hires can progress clearly through a column structure where they will be able to do five hires and then progress further onwards? My question was always what about the other 90 per cent of the children. I guess in the senior phase now, the way that it's oriented, it's a different concept because it's over three different years, and children do, young people do, mature at different rates, and the qualifications available to them over a three-year period gives a much greater flexibility and allows the youngster to learn at a stage when they're ready. Now, if you take it over that three-year span, then it does give you a much greater pot if you like to be able to mix about for youngsters, therefore the greater timetable and flexibility that I mentioned in that submission. I would support that completely. The concept of the senior phase that I was trying to take forward and I'm still taking forward was that it's a learner journey for young people and that, as far as possible, we want to be able to get what we offer as close to young people's needs and aspirations that can possibly be over that three-year period until they leave school. One of the things that I welcomed with Curriculum for Excellence was that I felt that it gave the opportunity to meet the needs of groups of young people or individual young people that the previous models didn't give us the chance to meet and that flexibility that Vincent refers to is one of the drivers for the way certainly I was involved in the evolution of the curriculum that lets make sure that what we offer is good for all of our young people and gives them all an opportunity and there were drivers around that which were the highest level of attainment achievement by the time they leave school and the most aspirational destination that they can achieve. So we always started with that and then worked our way back and I think that the senior phase as it is at the moment gives licence for schools to do that. Do you recognise there might be attention then perhaps because I take Vincent's point about the five column structure being really suitable for the most able but actually for kids who weren't able to achieve five hires in one sitting it wasn't really making their needs and perhaps there's attention then between you talked there Jerry about the needs of young people and perhaps our parents or wider society you know people who are a bit older and have gone through the system and maybe haven't recognised that it's changed and there's that natural clash because folk don't understand it's different now. I mean I think one of the things we have to continue to do is to get better to tell the story to people who came through a five column structure or whatever and give them that understanding of what we're trying to do for their children, for their sons and daughters and that we've got a chance to do much more for them than we ever did before and how we can do that but parental engagement around all of this is critical and I was interested in your own engagement with parents and the feeling from some that they didn't quite understand the senior phase I think we have to take a nice sense of that and do everything we possibly can to change that. I think I would agree with what Jerry is saying there I mean it is very much about making sure that we've got a senior phase that meets the needs of all our learners within East Renfrewshire we've had that focus on on raising attainment from before curriculum for excellence and through curriculum for excellence now but also on that wider on that breadth of opportunity and I think one of the key changes that we can see is that developing the young workforce focus and within the senior phase now that those partnerships with our colleges and universities and employers giving a far greater choice so if I take one of our high schools our fifth and sixth years have a choice of over 130 different courses that they can take some of those will take place in the school traditional highest advanced highest national five but alongside that a huge range of courses from level one to level eight which they can access in partnership with the colleges so it provides that opportunity to make sure that we're meeting all the learners needs I agree with my colleagues I think one of our biggest challenges is communicating with parents about all of the options that are available to our young people and helping our young people be in a place where they can go home and explain to their parents what their choices are and what the implications of those choices might be and where they might lead next and I think there's work that perhaps we could do together nationally to look at how we clear up that make that more accessible for families to understand the range of choices for youngsters so I think it's something that we'd benefit from having a closer look at together. Just finally on that raising a team point you mentioned there Dr Ratter I guess in the past it was the responsibility of local authorities to look at how they did that at a local level with for example QIOs and we know that those posts have diminished over the years I mean what is the responsibility then on regional collaboratives is that where you see their role coming in then to provide that challenge and support to the profession or does that is have a take on what that support should look like at a local authority level should we go back to the QIO structure because I know that under the previous system we did have a lot of good local expertise and I guess there is a fear in the profession that that local expertise will be lost because we don't have those posts anymore so is that the responsibility of the ricks to come in and fill that gap? I mean I can talk about within East Renfrewshire we still have that expectation and that focus that the central team along with our headteachers and our schools have that responsibility to bring about that improvement and to raise the attainment so I think it's that collaboration that we have where we work very closely with our headteachers whether that's in terms of looking at the curriculum designing the sort of reviews looking at attainment and working in response to them I think they're the collaboratives the regional improvement collaborative certainly as a member of the west partnership that is then adding that additional value where we can learn from one another and see what's working effectively in other local authorities I've been working closely with Glasgow recently where a group of secondary headteachers have had the opportunity from East Renfrewshire to work with a group of secondary headteachers in Glasgow to look at learning and teaching and to see about that best practice and how we bring about that improvement so I think first and foremost it still needs to sit with the local authority and then the regional improvement collaboratives adding that value in the system I think there is still a need within the local authority to continue to have that degree of support again we would have it centrally but our headteachers definitely see themselves as having a responsibility beyond their own school and trying to look at how they can build and support each other for that improvement perspective so you have an evolving picture with this where the notion of a qio coming out in order to try to simply hold people to account or to support people I think you need to be more than that I think that schools themselves that is the whole point of empowerment for schools take responsibility for that action are able to work together with the local authority and now we have the opportunity with the improvement collaboratives to look at scale to look to genuine to look at the best practice to see where there's like for like schools the demographic is similar and to be able to add some capacity to that as well from the Glasgow perspective and I suppose a local authority perspective I would reflect that completely but one of the things that I think was incredibly positive and remains incredibly positive is that networking between schools that is taking place we were in an event the other day that was run by the Bosch group which is a group of headteachers who've come together to help each other move forward a curriculum there were over 200 senior managers there working together to understand how to move the curriculum forward and certainly a days of position around having an empowered system is about that you know enabling people to work together and sending a message that your responsibilities a leader spreads out beyond your school and I think that's been a really positive aspect to it within the west partnership we certainly see an opportunity there to add value to that I think the project that Martin refers to has been really really successful Tony and I are on a group that are looking at how we can bring subject leaders closer together to network more and to learn from each other's practice and likewise primary colleagues to work together but certainly in the senior face context people coming together to help and work together is a really positive element of our system at the moment and both is from the ades perspective and I think from the local authority perspective and from a reasonable improvement collaborative perspective and if you let me I can name 45 other perspectives although I don't think it's helpful the message is it's we want to be empowered we want people to work together and schools I think are very much in that space. Thank you. I just had a small follow-up to Dr Stephen's point so you were talking to Stephen about pupils but also parents understanding the routes the routes potential routes through the different pathways that are available and I suppose at one time they did understand the routes because the routes were very similar and consistent right across the country students did standard grades and then if they went on they did hires and if they went on they did advanced higher and that was kind of well understood and what we've got is something much more diverse now with a lot more choices but you said you thought we could work together nationally to make that better understood and I just wondered what you really mean by that do you mean more consistency so that there's a bit more of a consistent model or what would you work together to do? My intention in that statement earlier was not about necessarily consistency but about finding better ways of explaining to people what their choices are and what the implications of them are so if I give you a practical example we work with young people at the moment to speak about foundation apprenticeships and how they may open up particular routes to employment that meet with individual children's aspirations about their future career and my own experience would suggest that sometimes when a young person goes home and speaks to family about a foundation apprenticeship that's something very new I agree with you and with what's been said earlier that most of us have gone through a system that we could recognise for each other and now it's shifting and it's different and I think there's an on-going challenge for us to communicate that the advantages the disadvantages of particular choices for individuals and it is about in my opinion individual learner pathways and what's particularly right for a young person because of where they're at now and where they want to get to choice booklet doesn't it and if the course choices are so complex and diverse that people have trouble navigating them I'm not sure what you're suggesting would improve that well there are some very good examples of excellent course choice booklets nationally that we're certainly looking at to improve our offer in Angus and I think it's back to what my colleagues have spoken to before it's about that sharing it's about seeing what's out there and what we can learn from each other okay thanks Smith I wonder if I could draw your attention to some of the evidence that we've had presented to us in previous sessions specifically from the academics and then from the is where the point was made quite forcibly actually that there is a feeling that there is a disconnect between the BGE and then the senior phase and in the case of Dr Britton he went on to argue that as a result of that he felt that the responsibility for curriculum development and therefore the accountability for it was not at all clear which might be some of the problems encountering the CFE concern at the moment could I just ask you to comment on whether you think there is a disconnect between BGE and the senior phase okay there shouldn't be a disconnect between the BGE and the senior phase that's the first thing I would say and I think there's an iterative element to this and I think that that disconnect may have been in place maybe three four five years ago but as we're understanding the senior phase better as schools are engaging with the learner journey more effectively that disconnect is starting to get less I would suggest and it should be less because one of the design principles for curriculum for excellence was progression and what we were charged with planning was a progressive education for young people from 3 to 18 from my perspective as a secondary head that was very much I really kicked into that about 10 to 18 so the curriculum is designed in the schools that I worked in and in the schools that I engage with to say that really there should be a progression from first year right the way through the BGE into the senior phase and actually it should be a six year experience pick you up on on that issue I mean there are some who would argue very strongly that the BGE in terms of languages in terms of the first taste of science subjects the progression is very weak because there is a huge downturn in the number of young people up taking up the modern languages qualifications and in STEM subjects and they point to the fact that obviously that has concerns for the economy as well as for the educational experience if that is correct and is quite clearly correct from the statistics we've got from sqa is that not a major concern that in some of the core subjects in the senior phase there appears to be quite a squeeze and that could be detrimental to the core curriculum would you accept that no I wouldn't accept that although I understand where it comes from if I can take modern languages for a second and because I was coming here today I took time to check in with some of my modern languages colleagues on this issue and the message I got I mean I think there's one thing that we that hasn't been said and I think should be said was that modern languages in fourth year in schools in third and fourth year in the standard grade era was compulsory everyone had to do a modern languages a modern language and inevitably when it wasn't compulsory there was going to be a reduction in young people taking it up some of that was also reaction to the fact that you could make a decision and take up and young people quite thought that's quite good I can do that now so I will however where it what I would the feedback I got from my modern languages colleagues was where we can develop a passion for languages where we can develop a curriculum where young people see the relevance and the meaning in it and what it can do for them that's where we have most success the building of this for modern languages for me starts in primaries and for me is either second years in primaries working together to build the skillset of primary colleagues or finding ways for second-year primaries to collaborate and delivering modern languages better in primaries and I would suggest also in p5 if I can do a dad moment for a second my son studies French in nursery and he was a much better French speaker in nursery than he subsequently turned into than he is now so I think we can grow modern languages I think there was an inevitable reaction to not being core anymore and I think we're now growing it through primary growing it through learning and teaching in the in the bge and in one of the schools where I was head it had had that squeeze that you that you described and now we are back to in that school higher French higher Spanish thriving young people at national five and national four and that's been about the quality of the curriculum that's been developed in that school in the bge is your point given the statistics which are pretty dire for modern languages and the uptake for sqe higher and advanced higher are you making the point that the senior phases is now designed will undo this squeeze somehow because you know there are other subjects that are complaining bitterly about this squeeze as well and listening to the geographers just yesterday they are very worried that the number of the core curriculum subjects are being squeezed out and that notwithstanding all the benefits of the flexibility that core is just so important to the breadth of your educational experience across the senior phase is that not a concern because that's one of the very strong pieces of evidence that's coming to us from all quarters I've seen that evidence and I've been very interested in that evidence and there were two things that occurred to me about it the curriculum for excellence was designed to give our young people a breadth of learning and a breadth of experience the bge was about that breadth one of the ways that we can deal with some of those concerns from our geography colleagues and our stem colleagues and modern languages in there as well is continue to challenge schools to raise the bar of the bge because young people will study in every curricular area until the end of s3 my understanding of how we should develop the curriculum we can raise the bar of the bge so that they learn that a level that will meet the needs of society meet the needs of employers and meet their needs create qualifications if they have to drop these subjects if they are motivated enough and if they see their relevance in the meaning of it they won't drop the subjects but that's really the responsibility of the subject sorry mr lion in some schools in terms of the columns the number of columns being squeezed they have to drop them that's the point that's being made by them that's not the experience where in some schools where the subjects continue to grow I take your point absolutely that nationally you can see that but for me that always comes down to the same thing can we get the curriculum right can we get learning and teaching right and can young people see their relevance so in some ways you might see less young people doing the subjects but those young people will be more motivated they will see the relevance of it and those that aren't have still learned at a level that will allow them to deliver what society needs from them in those areas and I think that's really important forgive me for saying so mr lion but I think that parents particularly feel very uneasy about that and therefore that's one of the reasons why there is concern for the point that you raised regarding our message I think that there is a genuine concern that the choices of the core curriculum are being squeezed in schools and that this is a concern to employers never mind to people within our education sector could I just finish my questioning on the point would you abs I think it's a cup of water to respond to your first question so we take them and then we'll come back so Tony McDade. Thank you it was probably just a point about whether about the disconnect activity that you had said as well you can understand about if you think of the scale of the exercise I think that that potentially is some reasoning behind that if you're looking at them an implementation of a scale in which you're looking at implement the broad general education and then looking at changes to the national qualifications inevitably people will want to make sure that the technical part of those courses if you're moving into national qualifications are correct lining up an s1 experience then into an s4 experience probably needs now an opportunity to reflect back now we've been able to settle it down now people know what a national five or a national four or indeed changes to higher looks like you're then now gone through the broad general education a number of times you need to look at the quality of the learning experience I think and you need to see how how progressive that learning experiences are for example in first year if you're looking at inquiry skills and social studies that those inquiry skills are the very inquiry skills that you need in higher and that you're able to line those up together and I think we're now in a position that we're able to do that but I do take the point and if people remember previously five to 14 then young people would start the standard grades and then they're higher it was quite a disconnect so the learning that was taking place in the history class in first year didn't necessarily connect to the standard grade experience or indeed the higher when they were looking at different skills what you now have a chance with here is lining that up together so I do think there's a there is an opportunity for not only greater progression but probably a better coherence within the structure themselves thanks here can I make a couple of points here first of all in relation to the broad general education education it's important to say the local authority I come from has significant staffing issues and that has an impact on broad general education because inevitably when you don't have enough staff in the school then the staff will be deferred to the national four five senior face classes secondly coming here today I added a bit of analysis on exactly what you're saying the subject uptake and it's purely in entries but it's on numbers and also percentages and looking at the Aberdeenshire perspective we don't see any downturn in the subjects that you mentioned the philosophy of the broad general education is for 10 or 12 subjects to be delivered to an s3 stage where the youngster can potentially bank that information and the stage that progressed in the subject to be picking up at a later stage not a direct fall-on at s4 so that's the kind of philosophy of it so if you took the other side of the argument where you were saying that the reduction in subject the number of subjects within s4 would directly impact the output and level of qualification well what we've looked at as the entries for subjects like French and like art and design where it could be argued the point that you've just made and if I just look at for example the national five trend for French so the youngsters are selecting a national five in Aberdeenshire and French went down from 2014 to 2018 to 408 however the advanced higher and the higher figures would be shown to be up because in higher French the increase from 189 entries to 248 and indeed although the German went down so indeed did Spanish and again if I look at the art and design that figure increased from 212 to 239 which is an increase of 113 so I think what these figures tell me about my own local authority is although there is the issue that you described at the beginning that youngsters may discurries be discurries from taking those subjects at the initial part of senior phase when it is embraced in its totality then it would appear that youngsters are not being disadvantaged and the subjects that they would be looking to take there is there is no apparent decrease in that opportunity for them. On that point Mr Doctry, when we were given evidence back in 2013-14 when some Aberdeenshire schools I think out more sort of a boin area if my memory serves me correctly there were a lot of parental concerns about in Bancary I think where parental concerns were pointing to the fact that there had been a squeeze on the availability of subject choice could you just tell me exactly what the local authority has done to address that and to bring things back to what you've just described? We have encouraged the flexibility for head teachers now again I mean as I mentioned Aberdeenshire that from the south of Aberdeenshire Bancary in a boin the schools performed very differently from what they do in Fraserburn, Peterhead etc but we encourage the head teachers to have that flexibility to tailor your curriculum to best to the needs of the youngsters from the community that you're serving so you will find that there are a percentage of our young people who do do seven accredited qualification courses in forth here from different areas but there would also be the encouragement for we've got youngsters who are presented for higher courses in S4 for example in advanced higher so early presentation would be encouraged but again it's within the spirit of providing the right pathway for the individual youngster and therefore you know you get trends within local communities and it's the flexibility that the totality of that curriculum and the timetabling flexibility that gives you that allows that opportunity to be given and again it's for the the youngster at the correct stage so the evidence I have for the local authority that I'm looking after is that this has now came through so that initial question that a parent would have had they're going to do if they've only got six subjects they're not going to do music and they're not going to do art and design because they're going to have to do the six subjects that we're looking to get them in in fifth year to qualify for university well that's not relevant that's not the way that it should be and what we're seeing is that that's feeding through so it's about the exit qualification that youngsters are achieving okay thank you sorry I just wanted to add which is a certificated course that's growing in the bge which is modern languages for life and work I don't know if anyone's mentioned that to and again it's a it's something that modern languages embrace and I think one of the real strengths at the moment is that modern languages are now realising you know we've got an issue here we need to find ways to do it and modern languages for life and work has been that young people are coming to the end of their bge with a certificated course with something that's accredited and which is focused on how they use that language in life and work and it's just a part of the picture which I think is important to share thank you Rona Mackay thank you convener yes good morning I'd like to explore the issue of subject choice variation within a local authority area I think we all have constituents who come to us complaining that their child can't take a particular subject but two miles down the road in another school they could so is there an argument for a kind of local authority wide policy on subject choice in the senior phase in s4 I mean within East Renfrewshire we have an approach where as colleagues have been describing the school will design their curriculum to meet the needs of their students and broadly across East Renfrewshire students will select eight subjects sometimes nine in s3 as they blend the experiences and outcomes into the senior phase and in s5 they'll choose generally five subjects and three or four in s6 but within that flexibility that the schools have we also then operate within a sort of broad framework of agreed principles and colleagues have mentioned that that need to make sure that that cluster planning from three to eighteen is very strong that's been a key element for us and also for us one of the key elements is that in the senior phase the s5 and s6 timetables are aligned so that if certain subjects are not available in a particular school perhaps at advanced higher because of the size of the school and the scale then they're able to access that in another school. Just on that point I mean I don't know if you know how common that is I don't think it's that's happening in my local authority area I'm not really talking so much about advanced higher it's talking about s4 choice you know that with the column structure they just can't take one and they could take it another one down the road and I don't know sounds great what you're talking about but I'm not sure that it's happening in my local authority area. Can I maybe just ask those who are representing local authorities just to each indicate what their position is? The Glasgow position is that the communities in Glasgow are so diverse that each school as Mark has described has to design its curriculum to meet the needs of this community that it serves so for example you know Holyrood and Hillhead serve a very different community from Castlemalt High School in St. Margaret's meetings so to have one approach would not be suitable in that context. In terms of the consortium arrangements that Mark's talking about Glasgow has worked to bring the timetables together particularly on a Tuesday in a Thursday afternoon when they're aligned so that young people can travel as appropriate and certainly there is an understanding in Glasgow that young people can be offered a wider range of opportunity where schools work together so schools are very open to taking young people from different schools and courses that they're running but you know other schools aren't running. That tends not to be a fourth year scenario that tends to happen further down and up in the senior phase and particularly in S6. Unfortunately what you're describing has been a scenario long before curriculum for excellence as well that you know there's only at times so many subjects we can deliver and young people can't always get this individual subjects that they want even though they were all on the table right at the start but there's some timetabling issues at Vincent's disgust but certainly the concept of being able to travel and being able to get a wider range through schools working together is a well-established practice in Glasgow and I would imagine my colleagues are going to reflect that across all local authorities. So we're striking the balance between individual schools developing their own curriculum alongside we have eight secondary schools so the eight secondary schools getting the benefit of working together so like colleagues we have a common timetable across all eight secondary schools which we have developed in partnership with Dundee and Angus College through a strategic partnership arrangement that means that all our youngsters are going to the college courses on the same day across Angus and their staffing and practical benefits as well as benefits from the young people getting to meet each other from across Angus. So we're really trying to respond to community needs individually through the curriculum whilst benefiting from working together and really trying to capitalise on some partnerships with core employers in the region so Breakin High would be an example of we have developed in partnership with a local roofing business, a construction centre on the site of the secondary school that allows us to offer qualifications alongside an employer in partnership and it's been really successful so it's really trying to get the best of both worlds for us. South Lanarkshire? We've worked quite closely with our schools about trying to develop a framework it didn't make sense for us to have one full curricular model if you think we have some very rural schools and we've got very urban schools so the notion of having a fully integrated model that you would set up for a college day when in actual fact our college afternoon when most young people who were in our rural areas were spending most time travelling what we tried to do is work with those schools to try to have the vocational offer on site as well so if we take foundation apprenticeships we have a blended delivery model where we work with some of our local colleges, some training providers and indeed we'll deliver those foundation apprenticeships in our schools as well so you've tried to get it. I think the only other thing I would say is there is a strong relationship between the broad gen of education and what's happening in that third year and the quality of that experience as it moves in. I do also think that it is an experience that's based over fourth, fifth and sixth. You can understand parents that are saying you know I've in my school at six well over here at seven but I think when the conversations are had at local community levels with the children and the families to talk about why that is the case this is not just about your fourth year you can do this when you can do another subject when you move into fifth year or indeed what you're trying to get to and I think that conversation with a young person about their career and what they're trying to do and that you can do that those qualifications across the full senior phase I think that's an important conversation and I think when you have that explanation at school level it does help but you can understand a natural anxiety for people if they're having a conversation between two different households that are serving two different communities. Back to the earlier point about communication I think doesn't it yeah? Sir Prudentia? Communication should go beyond course booklets you know it should be about conversations it should be about encouraging parents to come into the school it should be about having conversations not about the generality of it all but about you know your child your aspirations your hopes and how we can best meet them and it's how we get to do that better and more regularly which I think will lead to parents being more confident in what's happening in their schools and Aberdeenshire? Thanks chair just to say that in Aberdeenshire the geography of Aberdeenshire makes those consortia arrangements just slightly more difficult but as Tony was saying I think as this has always been an issue you know as a head teacher I remember that parents would come in you would find why can't my son do these five different choices and it ends up the explanation of it is the question back well why would they be doing those five subjects can we explain just a wee bit more about that but what I would say is in the last few years I have detected a distinct decrease in the volume of those conversations and it's definitely down to you know that that that you could say that you know it's it's it's being better understood the concept that because you can't get that subject at that point you know that doesn't mean you will not be able to study that that subject and as I say if you're banking these qualifications in third year then that's how it's set up you should be able to uptake that subject at any point throughout your your senior phase okay thank you can I just ask what authority or entitlement apparent has in that conversation or the student because all very well having a conversation but if the conversation starts with no you can't do this and it concludes with what we've told you why we can't do it that's not really a conversation and I want to I mean reflect more experience apparent in that regard but I wonder if that predates curriculum for excellence are you suggesting that we should have a model where in fact you can you have an entitlement to push or for that conversation to be something other than you know sorry we can't help you with that the phase that I use all the time is learner journey planning and if you take the the senior phase as a three-year learner journey you know rather than saying to a parent that you know you can't do that I think what would be more inclined to say well let's look at how we fit in everything that you know you want for your child in the three years that they're going to be with us and I think that's a much better start to the conversation that's a factor of conclusion if you still get to the point where it's not going to give you the options that you want and we have that the empty column syndrome sorry for the empty column and where people there's a column where basically is no matter what experience again there's absolutely nothing that column I want to do I'd like to do something else I'm having to do that and there's a kind of a constraint I just I'm just I think I wonder how honest we need to be with parents about what are the limits on young people the limits on their choices like a couple of really good points in there one is about honesty and that at times does you do get to a point when you say well look I've tried every different way that I can look at this for you and at the moment I just can't offer that and we did find ourselves in that city and occasion and that was a staffing issue very often where we just couldn't run the subject so that your right honesty is is really really important more schools are looking at different models of timetabling now inevitably you end up with columns don't you and I because you have to call them to get everyone into timetable but more schools are looking at starting that process with a free choice exercise where you say to young people based on your tracking pick your you know pick your best subjects based on your destination I always said start with your destination pick the subject you need then the subject you're best at and then the subject you enjoy and that's the starting point for the discussion I think that's a very positive starting point and then the columns are constructed from that basis rather than starting with the columns and everyone's god to fit in which leads to empty column syndrome which is a lovely phrase which I will now steal and use regularly across the discussions and the more we engage parents right at the start about what we're able to do and why we're able to do it the better chance we have of parents at times accepting something that perhaps they wouldn't have in the past I'm sure we all agree that there's also a limit and free choice again it's a parent there was a kind of a we don't want some you know the extent to which you're balancing what's in the interest of young person with their their choice cruise welcome to have us scott at this point and I'm going to ask Ian Gray to ask his questions and I'll look back so we're talking a lot about course choice and the options that are there and maybe I suppose you could argue as bit of an oversimplification but the core of the work we've undertaken in this report has been around subject choice s4 and the number of certificated courses that pupils can choose and looking at the evidence it's quite interesting that there seems to be a difference not only within school between schools but between authorities so for example the evidence from East Renfrewshire says that most s4 pupils will study eight subjects some of the other authorities the evidence would seem to be that most of them most schools it would be six and I just wondered why you've come to a different a different position why is East Renfrewshire eight and the others are not certainly that it wasn't a local authority position that Glasgow came to it was a school by school position my own experience in the schools where I was head teacher was that I went to parents and I said to them in terms of the senior phase the options we have available to us are the following you can we do eight just now is eight the right number and st Andrew's 86% of parents said no that's the wrong number because of the eight they're very good at six or they really like six and the other two they only did because they had to they also felt five was also the wrong number because it was too narrow and we then came to six and seven the number of subjects is not driven by a kind of you know here's what we're going to do it's about engagement with the community to see what would best serve the needs of our young people across the three years of the senior phase and fourth year six six in there okay thanks sure again in 2013 Aberdeenshire took the position to consult with schools but you know basically to say that will reduce the column structure will reduce from eight to six subjects in the main and I would have to say that the overall most youngsters in Aberdeenshire in fourth year have the option to do six subjects and then and then additionally but I always think it's important to remember you know you're going from eight subjects is remember standard grade that's a subject delivered over two years and national five subjects are delivered over the one session so it's a lot to do with the timing of the the makeup of the courses as well that's really important to be on that mind well let me come back to that point but sorry let's hear from the other with it with any strength for sure we we did look at moving away from broadly eight subjects in in fourth year as a group of head teachers and with the senior team at the centre we actually looked at sort of alternative timetable models and looked to see and we could we could do those but I think as a group looking at the so we had a series of criteria that we'd worked through that had originally been introduced by HMI around 2005 and essentially I think the group felt that it was in having listened to parents and to the pupils and to the staff that they didn't feel the case had been made and that actually they wanted to predict the structure that they had so it did come down to saying this was what they felt was in the best interests of of their pupils and so they we've we've broadly struck with the eight and now that is a flexible so we'll have some youngsters that will like I say in some cases do a ninth subject they can pick up PE and we'll have some that'll do fewer where it's not appropriate so I was speaking to a head teacher yesterday in advance of this meeting who was talking about a couple of youngsters that he had in his school in fourth year that compete at a very senior level in terms of athletics and football and they have a bespoke timetable again to make sure that it is meeting their needs so it people aren't forced through a particular model but overall it was felt that it met the needs of our learners. South Lancer perspective it's predominantly six or seven subjects there are a couple of schools that will look at eight. The conversation though for us was about what was happening within the context of the broad general education and that transition year of s3 what was the quality within that eight curricular areas that were covered and then importantly with the subjects that were being undertaken in s4 and again I can understand whether the conversation is focused on s4 but were those young people able to look at s5 and s6 pick up their hires of their national qualifications and also importantly other forms of qualifications as well that we weren't being enslaved to one particular model and if we were able to do that the schools weren't just going to look at that s4 experience in isolation that you really then needed to look at the journey of that young person as he moved into fifth year and indeed sixth year or importantly what was the quality of their experience if they were a fourth year lever and I think that that's a crucial point to that as well. In Angus it's usually six subjects in s4 and that came about after building the curriculum three I think when we were translating national policy into what we were going to do locally and engagement with people at the time the eight secondary head teachers at the time came to the agreement that they felt that they would wish a model working together and s6 was felt to best meet the needs of our context. We've had some recent discussions with our parent council chairs around about whether that still feels like it meets the needs of our young people the general feedback from that discussion was yes but it's something that I think over time we will continue to review and explore. If I can paraphrase the panel's responses, most of you spoke to parents to see what they wanted. In Angus you thought you were implementing national policy and came to s6. In Eastrend speaking to parents you ended up at A. Everywhere else it was s6. Perhaps you can understand why the committee feels that this is quite hard to understand. It's difficult to understand why parents in Eastrend should feel so much more strongly than in Aberdeenshire or whatever. The other element of this surely is the relationship of s4 not just to s5 and s6 but to s3. For example, Dr Ratter, you said earlier on that your students choose a number of courses in s3 and then take some of them on through s4.  That's why you're able to do 8. That's why your pupils can take 8 subjects, isn't it? Certainly in terms of our headteachers and our schools look at making sure that we've got an appropriate gradient of learning that goes right the way through from 3 through to 18. All seven secondary schools plan very closely with cluster colleagues in primary and early years to make sure that there is that curricular continuity. For example, in reading, 90 per cent of learners will have achieved the second level by the time they start in s1. It's about making sure that they then build and have those progressive learning experiences. In terms of s3, it's crucial that that is still based around the principles that you would expect for a broad general education. We did a review a couple of years ago and spoke to a large number of pupils. We had 700 responses in terms of questionnaires, staff involved to make sure that that was about a distinct experience from the fourth-year experience, that it wasn't a case of focusing on examinations in s3, but it was allowing the learners to lead their learning, to take forward digital learning, in terms of developing the young workforce. However, we recognise and make sure that the learning that takes place in s3 is part of that continuum that enables them to achieve success in s4. In other words, that is not a criticism because Easterlands results, as you have just said, are very good. You are essentially delivering those certificated courses that are sat in s4 across s3 and s4, because the s3 learning is at a level at which s3 is at. You are really delivering them over two years. That is why you have seen poor connectivity. Some of that learning was alluded to by the Education Scotland paper that was produced in 2016 that looked at what that progression from broad general education into the senior phase should look like. We very much make sure that we take on board that learning and that that is part of that progressive nature in that way. My question to Mr Doherty is that you described something similar to that. You said that the learning in s3 must be of a quality that allows it to be banked in order to contribute to further learning in that topic further on. Why can't your pupils use that to essentially do that four or that five courses across two years and complete eight of them in s4 in the same way as Easterlands does? Our attainment pattern is now showing that the core of attainment is continuing to improve. However, you mentioned earlier on that this is becoming more complex. It is a much more complex world and the future is going to be even more complex. In terms of preparing youngsters for a world to go into that is uncertain, it is inevitably going to be that there is going to have to be this. Increasingly complex mixtures of experiences, skills and qualifications. I think that that is best delivered through the model that curriculum for excellence has identified. That is a model where you would make sure that entitlement—we are all talking about entitlement in broad general education—that is really the trick for this. It is the key that if that is really strongly delivered, and I am saying from S1 to S3, it is well beyond that. If the youngster has between 10 and 12 subjects and cover in all the areas that they have to cover, the progression can go on, not just to s4 but can be picked up at later stages during the senior phase, then what I am saying is in relation to national progression awards and foundation apprenticeships and other measures of qualification that youngsters can get, as well as those youngsters. As we find in Aberdeenshire that the youngsters who are going to get five hires and go to university are still continuing to do that, and that is what people have mentioned before in Bancuray and Aboyne. That continues to happen, but that now serves in a much more equitable way a much bigger range of the population. The world is not any more complicated in East Remfrewshire than it is in Aberdeenshire. Are you suggesting in East Remfrewshire that the approach that has been taken is less equitable? Why can their pupils complete successfully eight subjects in S4, but in Aberdeenshire that is not appropriate? I will mention this because you mentioned about the attainment profiles. It may be in this whole thing about being contextually specific. Contextually specific for youngsters who move it into schools on about East Remfrewshire to do exactly that attainment profile and that educational experience must fit their aspirations and aspirations of their parents. That would be similar for areas of Aberdeenshire, such as Bancuray and Aboyne. However, in the geography within Aberdeenshire, there is a bigger totality to be… In Bancuray and so on, they should be able to follow a similar model, but they don't. I have said that in Bancuray, because I mentioned them twice, in Bancuray and Aboyne, you would find that pupils in Bancuray and Aboyne in Aberdeenshire do more qualifications in S4, which is perfectly correct and so they should, and would maybe be more suited to what Marx explained to us there. There is that variety, but my point is that that variety and flexibility is more able to be catered for within the senior phase and broad general education setup that we have within curriculum for excellence. I also think that the conversation should be looking at the journey of that young person in fourth year over fourth and fifth year and indeed into sixth year as well, because the notion, and we haven't really cracked this, and I know that that's been part of some of your conversations as well about the young person that may bypass that qualification in national five. I think that there is merit, but parents are understandably reluctant at the moment when we've not convinced them that taking away that assessment burden will be in their best interests. I think that you then need to be quite robust in how you monitor and track if you think about some young people, you double the time you'll have their pacing learning. So I think that there are pros and cons, so for some you need to have the flexibility of the one-year activity, or indeed it's completely appropriate for some young person to take away the national five because you can see them as they come in, they are higher candidates, and we need to just try to be as flexible as possible. We've not probably cracked that bit. I think that I would add to that as well, that the journey to the highest possible level is what it's about rather than the different stages along the way, which is eight and fourth year and whatever in fifth year. The other area that we've not really explored as much as I think it would be interesting to explore is also to what extent can young people be presented for higher at the end of fourth year in areas where they're particularly able and music would be an obvious example of that, where young people are playing music at a very, very high level and could pass the higher music, very young, but wait until the end of fifth year to do it. I think those are the kind of flexibilities that are really interesting to explore, two-year higher programmes. Young people do not eat national fives but eight courses, some of which are at higher in fourth year if they have the ability, but it's really important that parents are engaged in that, that there's robust tracking and wanting to make sure that progress is right and that the pace of learning is at the highest possible level. We've heard in evidence in previous sessions about the mixed economy, if you like, that there is in terms of the influences that there are on the curriculum and the structure of the curriculum in different parts of the country, but obviously there's the role of the SQA that there has been in shaping the senior phase. We've heard from Education Scotland and others. I just wonder if any of you could say anything about your take on that mixture of influences on the curriculum, whether you feel there's a case for more or less intervention? I think that I have a collective responsibility. I think that you can't ignore that the wishes of a community are a school and working very closely with schools themselves. The role, I think, for us at local authority level is to provide that support and direction to try to make sure that those schools are well supported. There is, of course, a difference between and this is probably why you see schools taking one step at a time. They're very conscious of their responsibilities around young people, but we're in a position in which we can try to provide that support and direction. We try to work closely with the national agencies as well to make sure that they're on board, that they will be able to give us a national picture, that they will be able to give us a direction from an international perspective as well, but I do think that there's a collective responsibility for all of us to look at that. I would share that, I think, as an education community. We have to meet the needs of young people, but the most important driver is where are young people going to go when they leave school, what is their destination going to be, how do we get them to the highest possible level, and then we all have to work together to find ways of doing that. To me, that's the influence. What are young people telling us, what are parents telling us, what are destinations telling us, and let's drive everything towards the end. Tony is absolutely right. All the agencies have to work together, all the people have to work together and keep young people right at the heart of this. If we do that, the influences are what they are, but we're still focused on the right thing. I would just add to my colleagues that I agree, and I think that curriculum is a collective responsibility, and I think that our conversations need to also include the quality of the learning experience. As well as focusing on the what of the curriculum, I think that it would be helpful to have those conversations, debate like we're having now, about the how. How do children learn, how do young people learn, what kind of learning is going to support them to have the critical thinking, creativity, all the skills that they're going to require in a changing world, and I think that together all of the agencies involved can bring something to that conversation. Thank you. Related perhaps to that, and it certainly relates to a point that was made earlier on by Jerry Lyons about the job of work that is on-going to explain to parents the choices that there are. Is there more than going to be said about what practically might be done to improve that conversation or assist that conversation, and also related to points that were made earlier on around flexibility, whether parents understand that not only is there a variety between schools, but there might actually be flexibility within schools when it comes to choices? I do think that there are some good opportunities when you look at the practical examples of the learner journey. Again, possibly one point is the way in which schools have engaged with local businesses and indeed universities and colleges to show that there can be complete flexibility and how a young person may end up in a first-year university course. It might very well have been embarking on national four qualifications and wider achievement, building the profile as they move along from the school. The college is making a contextual offer, I think, of Strathclyde University Engineering Academy, or I look at Glasgow University's widening participation. It is convincing our parent body that it is okay to do something different and then giving very practical examples of what that looks like. For the young person, it may very well be the traditional—they have gone in the traditional—subject routes straight into university and moved on into their pathway. I think that for some others that journey is very different now, but I think that universities, colleges and employers are better. There is still a bit to go, but I think that trying to give some of those very practical examples about the differences of that journey is important. One of the best pieces of work that I have seen emerge in this area is describing young people's learner journeys. I was looking at some of the schools in Glasgow and in other schools in local authorities, where they have taken a young person and said, this was what their destination was, but this was the route that they took in their school to get there. Then getting young people along to parents' information evenings to say, this was my learner journey. In St Andrew's, we had a great experience where we brought three different pathways, and we brought a young person from each pathway to tell the story of, this was my journey through the senior phase. It was great to hear parents come out and say, that boy that spoke, that's my boy, and I now know what he needs. I think that young people can tell this story for us really well. I think that taking individual learner journey stories, there was a bit of work that was done a few years ago by Education Scotland, where it was kind of notional. Now it's not, now it's real. Now we can tell real stories to say, there's a young person who came through our school and got to the destination that way. There's a different young person who got to the same destination, which is what it was, and went a completely different way. I think that we can pull that together in all kinds of ways to tell individual learner journey stories. I think that parents get that, and I think that that would be a really positive thing for us all to pull together and make that widely available. I absolutely would echo that. I think that there's a responsibility on all of us in the system, and certainly one of the things that we've found that has been effective is that partnership with Skills Development Scotland and their careers advisers and coaches, and that's starting as early as possible. Are those discussions starting in S1, looking at bringing together those learner pathways along with that future planning for what young people would like to do post-school and making sure that, in terms of those discussions, along with parents, that along the way, at the various milestones, they've got the information that they need, and I think that that would, along with those individual pupils, complement it very well. The conversations that we're talking about that take place between schools and parents. Indeed, young people don't take place in a vacuum, they take place in an environment that's partially informed by what's in the public domain and what's going on in the media. We, as a committee, just yesterday received evidence from COSLA from their children and young people spokesperson Stephen McCabe, who said that young people could be at the centre of a debate overly focused on political considerations rather than building on the many strengths of the system that we have. Discuss. One side of A4. It is challenging that debate, isn't it, when, if you're looking when we were speaking to our schools and they see the tangible improvement for some of those young people, if we think of some of our fourth-year levers that were potentially heading into negative destinations, that now I've got a training provider, that now, because of the flexibility within the curriculum that's offered to them, that journey has been changed for those young people, I know that there's been lots of conversation on that. All of our young people are important to us, but those young people are particularly important to us because we know that they're leaving at its earliest point and some of their traditional destinations have been poor for us, so I think that conversation is challenging for us. I think that it sometimes can have a negative impact on our schools, the feeling of uncertainty that creates across the system. The thing I would say is that it would be helpful to build on and recognise some of the particular strengths that are going on within it now so that we're not always potentially, of course we need to look at improving, but we also need to look at the things that are going well and to try to capitalise on the things that are going well. One of the things that I think is I found frustrating in my time as both as head teacher and now in local authority is the negativity at times that appears under press around our education system and who generates that? I'm not altogether sure, but there's really fantastic work going on in our schools and there's really fantastic things happening for young people and we need to get that story out because while I'm the same as Tony, there are things we can do better. You guys have picked up on some of that and I think that's really important, but the backdrop of discussion about how do we do things better should be. Look at all the things we are doing really well and I think that you're part of this community as well and we're part of the community together. Let's do that together, tell the positive story of what we are doing and use that as a springboard for the things that we could do better so that we could do even better for our young people and for our country. Tavish Scott. I thank you for your apologies for late. As convener, it's not every day I get a primary school from Shetland down in Parliament so I was showing them around and they had a lot of questions they'd ask you guys, but I'll resist that because I might be accused of Alistair of being political. I was actually going to ask about the senior phase and the definition of the senior phase because last week in evidence, Larry Flanagan of the EIS said that he couldn't put his finger on what the senior phase was actually for and that worried him as the leader of the biggest teaching union in Scotland and if he can't then I'm not sure who can. So you're all senior practitioners in this game, can you define the senior phase for me and what you're trying to do? Yeah, I think that what was happening was to build, it's a progressive curriculum from 318 that was to build on the benefit of a broad general education that then specialised and picked up some qualifications for young people as well, build on their skills, talents and abilities that they've had from 3 to 15 and absolutely try to make sure that those young people are then focused to the destination that they needed. For me that there's an entitlement which is very clearly stated that the senior phase should be the phase of education for young people, gain qualifications and continue to develop the four capacities. So there's an entitlement within curriculum for excellence and all the curriculum for excellence documentation that was a driver of the senior phase and by my understanding of it the second driver of the senior phase was that young people have the right to support into a positive and sustained destination and the senior phase is about that and the last thing for me is that the senior phase allowing for developing the young workforce becoming part of this discussion is as much as possible to get flexible pathways for young people so that they can gain those qualifications, develop those four capacities and gain those positive destinations, that for me is what the senior phase is about. For me it would be that the two key words are specialisation and choice because it's when the youngsters would reach that sufficiently mature stage where they would have that entitlement for the specialisation and choice and that's where the accreditation and the gaining of qualifications come in so I think that's quite clear. I mean I would agree with the comments that my colleagues have made for us it is about continuing that opportunity to develop. As Gerry was saying those four capacities particularly in fifth and sixth year giving youngsters opportunities in terms of leadership to develop their skills, build their confidence along with their further achievements and that portfolio of qualifications that will allow them to progress to a positive lever destination. Anything that's already been said but I'll say and for me there's a bit about in the same way that S1 in a secondary school should feel different to primary school. For me senior phase should feel different to broad general education for all the reasons that my colleagues have described. That was a whole range of different things. There's a whole range of different answers. I mean there's a layer.  You've given a range of answers. I'll try the question and I'm the teacher here so you can hold on a minute here Gerry. What Larry Flanagan was saying is in the context it relates to Alasdair Alasdair's first question about the agencies, that the clarity that I guess you'd expect that we'd all expect from the system isn't there from the senior adviser to the government which is Education Scotland. That's the part I'm interested in. I mean you've all set out I think very compelling arguments as to what your senior phase is trying to do but can you show me where that is set out in a coherent form for the whole Scottish education system so all 32 senior leaders of education in 32 local authorities know exactly what's expected of them. Do you think that exists because Larry Flanagan didn't? Where I found everything was in the building the curriculum documents, that's where I found all my guidance. That to be one of the most difficult exercises that we looked at. When we looked at implementing the curriculum and the implementation group, I don't know if any of you sat on that. It was not coloured in success. Nine years of going round and round the circles. Listen, I don't think we do it ourselves any favours by denying that some things weren't as clear as they could have been. I think where we sit now is that you can hear five colleagues from local authorities describing for you in slightly different terms, slightly different nuances but fundamentally that we're all trying to do the same thing in the senior phase. Our understanding of that continues to grow, it continues to evolve and again as Tony made the point I think it's up to the education community to work together in order for that to become clearer for everyone in that and include yourselves in that but certainly I think the understanding of the senior phase is pretty clear and I saw what Larry said but for me I think there's a clarity about what we're trying to do now and it's growing through practice and through discussion and through working together to get there. At local authority level would that be fair to say? In a whole range of ways across local authorities, schools working together across local authorities, local authorities working together a whole range of ways and education Scotland have been an important part of discussions that I've had on growing my understanding of some of that through the journey that I've had to get to understanding. I wanted to ask about equity and justice in this question because I understand that a school doesn't have so many young people who make five hires and other schools, in fact, you've said it yourself, well look those who are going to get five hires are going to get them anyway but surely part of the exercise must be about understanding why young people in a disadvantaged community are not able to actually achieve their full potential because you've already said you're shifting the resource elsewhere so I want to start first of all with multi-level teaching in classes. Larry Flanagan said last week there was an explosion in multi-level teaching so I'm interested what analysis you've done at your authority level on the scale of it, whether in fact it has increased and where are you more likely to be if you're in multi-level classes? In terms of ourselves the evidence has always been some degree of multi-level teaching whether that be in the senior phase if you're looking at some subjects are designed in terms of its outcomes that there are some of the practical subjects where it's more straightforward maybe I'll ask the latter part the last part of the question and inevitably there are some compromises practical compromises around some of our smaller schools that's in a few of a school of six hundred as opposed to a school of twelve hundred there are some things that are different self is rural in urban or is it within urban settings? No, this far as it's rural, so there's an understanding around that. Yeah, it's a rural setting for south Lanarkshire, our urban schools are larger than our rural schools. I think also the approach and the methodology of multi-level teaching has been there, there are some that we'll find, I think if you're asking teachers and I know the evidence that some teachers will find that a bit more of a challenge, I think inevitably if you're teaching a multi-level, sometimes a multi-level can happen during the course of a year, not just at the start of a year, if you're thinking about a young person embarking on a course of a higher who doesn't necessarily have that national five qualification but is potentially struggling with the qualification will stay in the class, continue to do the work and potentially be presented at national five, I think that's okay, I think that's not quite the starting out as an n4, n5 higher and advanced higher group, I think that could be much more challenging, I think it's more, some subjects lend themselves more than others, I think if it's very content or knowledge driven, I think that can be more challenging, especially if that content is different. However, the other thing I would say is sometimes the quality of the group dynamic or the learning experiences of those young people can also kick in as well and many teachers want to solve those issues for young people if two young people are coming to an advanced higher and saying I'd like to go into that class, teachers and schools try to be very practical. Can I clarify what we mean by multi-level? Is it about different levels of courses, national five higher in the same room or young people in fours in the same city? We've been told in some circumstances that national four or fives are higher and advanced higher in the same class. It's about levels and age as well. So it's about levels primarily that you're concerned with? I'm really trying to establish whether you are aware that the EIS is saying that there's been an explosion and what I'm trying to establish is whether the rural school is a bit more difficult or has it become the norm? Headteachers have the permission to do that and flea up other bits of the curriculum. That's the first thing that I'm interested in, but the second one is is it disproportionately in disadvantaged schools and how can that possibly sit in any notion of equity and fairness? The first thing that I would say is that bi-level teaching and multi-level teaching started with higher still. Once higher and intermediate two were together and people started to look and say, can they both be taught in the same classroom? My experience of bi-level teaching in Glasgow, if I can talk about Glasgow primarily, is that it's not something that we look to do, but it's something that we can do to extend pupil choice and to give young people more opportunities. Some courses lend themselves more to it than others. One of the things that was highlighted as we were going into senior phase course development was that some of the higher and intermediate two courses did not articulate well together, so can we create courses that do articulate well so that where necessary bi-level teaching could take place and no disadvantage to young people? A lot of subjects did that, not all subjects did, and one of my things would be that we should look and say, let's make sure that courses articulate so that where we have to have bi-level classes then we can deliver them. Multi-level, not just bi-level? Multi-level, I would suggest, is through necessity rather than choice. So it's timetable driven and resource driven? Not necessarily, yes, to some extent. What I suppose what I mean is, I don't think any of us would say we would look to have multi-level classes at all, but sometimes Tony talks about rurality in small schools. Glasgow, the issue is about small schools, not deprived schools. Some of those small schools are small schools because of what they offer? No, they are small schools because of the communities that they serve, given high school would be an obvious example. Is chicken and egg isn't it? If Castle Mock High is at Margaret Mary's, they are relatively small schools. One might have argued in the past that young people have gone from those schools because of the bigger up series of options for them in other schools. Certainly the recent inspection of Castle Mock High would suggest that that's not the case. They've just had a very, very positive inspection, and one of the things that was rated very highly in that inspection was the range of opportunity that was offered to young people within that school in Castle Mock. Bi-level teaching is something that, if we could possibly avoid it, I would suggest that we would prefer to, but where courses work well together, it can work very well. Where they don't articulate, that's where we are. I have to look at the courses or look at how we organise classes so that young people are not disadvantaged by that. Would there be an equality impact assessment done by your local authority if we were able to establish that disproportionately there were multi-level classes in disadvantaged schools? Would you direct resource? One of the things that was suggested by the EIS last meeting was that we might look at a model round the old model of areas of priority treatment. You might not necessarily use that term. I should say that I recognise absolutely that there is fantastic work going on in schools like Castle Mock. Other places that people might have, whether they are really serious working down there, I am not denigrating that. I am wondering if they deserve more support if you are talking about getting a level playing field round what it feels like to be in a senior phase in terms of what your classes look like? I think that two things I would say. The issue for me, in certainly looking across Glasgow, is about the size of school and what you are able to offer. Bi-level teaching is a way—multi-level, as you have referenced as well—of increasing that offer. That is about the size of school. I do not think that it is an issue of deprivation. The second point, I suppose, is that if you are offering more support and more staffing and more resource—yes, thank you very much—I will help that. Sadly, that is not within my gift, but I am wondering if—I mean, a serious question—that if the curriculum is managing disadvantage and there is a danger of amplifying it, when in fact what you could do, even within the resource that you have got, there is an equality impact assessment argument that says that you direct more resource into your schools. Outcomes in Glasgow have improved significantly at all levels across your city in the curriculum for excellence, Pira. That, to me, is the measure of what we are doing, and that tells me that what we are doing is improving things for young people and improving things for young people in poverty. We recently confirmed in our inspection around the Scottish attainment challenge that we were improving young people in poverty. So, whatever way we are going about doing that, we are having a very, very positive effect on the lives of young people and the outcomes that are part of those lives. But more resource would be in assistance? I do not think that any education profession will sound friendly, if you can say that more resource would not be in assistance. I might just mention that, certainly from an Aberdeen perspective, we have not detected any explosion in by or tri-level teaching, but I have to say from what we were discussing before, it is potentially one of the price, if you like, for the flexibility that can be created within the timetable. However, I would say that the most difficult places for us to do that in our current contacts would be the schools with the highest levels of deprivation. Therefore, it would not be in the design to plan by tri-level classes within there. What I can say is that, in terms of the attainment from the inevitable increase that has happened, there is no discernable downturn in terms of the attainment of the young people within those classes. In the disadvantaged communities, I wanted to go up the way, and I am just wondering, Professor Scott has given, I think, quite compelling evidence that the most disadvantaged and more disadvantaged still. I think that that is obviously something that we want to interrogate. I am just interested. My final point, and maybe you can come back to the committee later, is what work has been done to monitor that kind of offer across different schools. I hear what people say is not just certificate driven, but if your school is already disadvantaged in terms of the number of qualifications that are coming out of your school, then it actually does matter in terms of closing the attainment gap for them. I would only say about that, speaking on behalf of Glasgow. The evidence of Glasgow and the performance of Glasgow totally contradicts what Professor Scott said about that. That, for me, is how I measure the effectiveness of what we are doing with the curriculum and, in fact, all aspects of the work of our schools. I think that the idea of it an equality impact assessment is a really useful one for any policy change that we are thinking of. I think that it is a really important lens in which to consider change. I think that looking at certificated courses and offering in that way would be helpful. It would also be good to include other types of courses that are available. For some schools, where there are fewer hires than there were previously on offer, there are other qualifications that are on offer through partnerships with the college, partnerships with university, so it would be useful to explore them all in the round. Thanks very much. Only just to say that, to agree with what you are saying there, that focus needed to be on equity. All the local authorities are very much that excellence and the equity. With the East Remfisher, we talk about raising the bar for all and closing the gap. Certainly, in terms of Professor Scott's evidence, it wasn't from my own authority's point of view something that I recognised. We would have strong evidence both in terms of the broad general education, in terms of CFE attainment and teachers' professional judgments, along with taking perhaps lever attainment, looking at a range of different measures that, when we look at that from key equity groups, we are seeing that closing of the gap. Most of the questions that I was going to ask have been touched upon, but one thing that I did want to ask is that we talked quite a lot about the senior phase. Given that we now have had a number of cohorts of young people that have been through the senior phase, is there anything that you would change in the senior phase in order to be better serve young people? I mentioned at the notion that we can expand the offer of young people not necessarily sitting at full range of qualifications in fourth year, whether their ability allows them to do that. I think that some of it was about reducing the assessment burden and the assessment burden for those young people, whether it be fourth, fifth or sixth year, allowing them to recognise that wider experience and developing those skills that are crucially important as they move into the workplace or indeed into university. The one thing that I would say is for us to try to look at those models that are working, to try to give schools confidence that they can do that and also to give our school communities reassurance because it is uncertain for a family of a young person starting out in fourth year thinking that they are going to miss out on the national five qualification, when, in fact, it is a bit of a false conversation when that young person has the capability in order to do it. That is probably one of the aspects that I would look at. I would echo what Tony said and that flexibility in terms of when young people can be presented and at a time when they are most able, most ready and when is best for them. I think that I would want that. I would love to take the phrase alternative pathways out of the whole thing. Let's just talk about learner journeys for young people, not alternative pathways, because that suggests that you cannot be on your proper pathway. For me, taking away alternative pathways and removing the phrase extracurricular because nothing is extracurricular, let's make sure that we celebrate learning, not just in classes, fantastic work going on in schools in all kinds of ways and making that part of the picture as well would be something that I would certainly want to highlight so that the achievements of young people in the round are recognised. I suppose that it goes back to one of the points that was made earlier about I suppose continuing to be ambitious and looking back and thinking about ways at which we would continue to change it. Last year, our secondary heads engaged with the paper that Jerry had written about his curriculum in St Andrews, and we invited one of the head teachers from Glasgow that had completely changed their curriculum model because it was about continuing to look at what the evidence is telling us, what our results are showing, are we making the difference in terms of that equity, what can we learn from other schools where, as you were saying, we're now further in that senior phase journey. I suppose that it's not necessary that we particularly change it, but there would be that constant review and looking to see where is their headroom for improvement still. Alternative pathways and we'll try and avoid using that topic, but obviously schools have a lot of partnerships with colleges these days and there's vocational courses, foundation apprenticeships and so on, so what is the take-up in your area of these vocational courses and the foundation apprentices, et cetera, and how do we get the message across to parents and employers that these are equally as important qualifications as not four, not five, not six, et cetera? The uptake in terms of school-college partnership in Glasgow is high and growing and one of the things that we're doing as part of our employability strategy is working with our colleges to say how can we extend the offer and how can we give more opportunity in different ways foundation apprenticeships as part of that. Again, it's a growing picture and I think we're trying to understand better how we can offer foundation apprenticeships. Tony talked about it in school offers. One of the things that I hadn't, you know that we didn't think about things, that parents heard the word foundation in apprenticeships and thought it was like foundation standard grade and therefore there is something about communication so it's a growing picture, it's something we're recognising as more positive and we want to explore what the headroom is, but it's certainly growing. I think the point that you pick up is a really good one and I think it's come from your evidence which is we need to tell that story to parents better and stronger and get the message out that this is not something you do if you can't do other things, this is something you do because it's what's best for your child and which will lead to the destination. I think we've got more and more case laws, not the right word, but more and more examples and presidents and it's using them in discussions with parents so that they understand all the models and they understand that they are all important and not one alternative which is only for people who can't do anything else, so I still think it's just about pulling all that together. My own view is that a really good and effective senior phase isn't offered by a school alone, it's offered by a school in partnership with lots of people, a very important partner in that is the college. We're in a place in Angus where after the summer we will be moving to hosting a foundation apprenticeship in each of our eight secondary schools delivered by college staff from Dundee and Angus college. Now that has come about as a result of good relationships, good partnership working and a really shared view to improve outcomes for youngsters and I think when all partners can get something really meaningful out of that together and it becomes core delivery, so in our course booklets it's gone out with that information about foundation apprenticeships. I think that's really helpful for families to consider at home although I go back to we've got an on-going communication there to do because when I speak to young people about as I do, you know where are you going and what are you leaving to and I spoke to a young man who was going to join an accountancy firm to get his qualifications and the hardest people to convince that that was the right thing for him or his parents and what the school did in that case was support him with the pros and cons of different routes and support him to have that conversation at home, so I think there is on-going work to do around about that. I was just going to say you asked the question about if there's anything you would do differently and for me it certainly would be and that's been echoed in my colleagues responses there. It would be it's not selling it's explaining to parents what this whole thing was going to mean for the young people because certainly in the foundation apprenticeships, which in Aberdeenshire we've really moved that on, for the right reasons and it's definitely going to be the most appropriate thing for a much bigger number of young people in the future but the biggest barrier that we've encountered is that explanation to the parents and it's like I'm taking a gamble with my son or daughter's education here and you know I'm just unsure can you show me more can you tell me more and at the early stage you know I think the explanation and the clear understanding when no you know holds barred in terms of any preferences just that explanation to the parents you know and I think I would have done that differently in terms of senior phase and as a proposition. I think the best examples as well if you take some of the work based learning activity if you take foundation apprenticeships as an example of that then young people are moving into for them if it's appropriate moving into real employment opportunities as well that they're moving into real jobs that give them pay and an opportunity that it's not just some kind of esoteric activity that it really does translate you take early learning and childcare as an example of that that if a young person is doing a foundation apprenticeship and is the thing they're really interested in there are some really tremendous opportunities for them now that it moves into a modern apprenticeship that then gets them to become an early years worker those are the those are the kinds of things that will convince people that it's not just something that I'm doing while it's great to be doing it because it's good and indeed in some respects some young person may decide it's not the pathway and they'll develop general skills but there needs to continue to be a sharp focus that young people going into employability into employment that comes from some of these courses as well okay thank you very much we've come to the end of our panel session and thank you all very much for attending if there's anything you want to follow up on in terms of what you yourself said or any other evidence you think would be useful to the committee we were delighted to receive that from you so with that I thank you again and that concludes the public session for this week and next week's meeting we'll be taking evidence from the sqa on this inquiry and considering some subordinate legislation in early years childcare and I'm going to suspend for a few minutes before we move into private session but thank you very much again