‘Scotland’s schools are much better than they used to be’

‘Starvation is an Imperial Resource for Britain’ – a topic absent from my supposedly ‘world-leading’ education in Scotland back then

A letter in the Herald today is spot-on and will, I feel sure, echo many feelings here. It did mine:

https://www.heraldscotland.com/opinion/23977675.letters-scotlands-schools-much-better-used/

11 thoughts on “‘Scotland’s schools are much better than they used to be’”

  1. I agree totally with the above but would add that the writer fails to raise the ”apartheid” state of education in the Glorious Past .
    My experience in the East End of Glasgow was that after Primary and ”the Quali” only the chosen few would get the opportunity of gaining a ”better” education at the Senior Secondary academic level , the rest being consigned to Junior Secondary where they were viewed as less valuable than those who passed the ”Quali’.
    For all its faults the Comprehensive System , when introduced , levelled the playing field somewhat and abolished the pitiless Senior/Junior Secondary discrimination which did no favours for too many , particularly the Working Class pupil .

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  2. I agree , mostly , but schools in England were different to those in Scotland , the ones I went to anyway, I went to school in Dorset and Norfolk they were very different to those I went to in Angus.
    I was at them 67 to 73 , the difference I noticed was that English schools were much newer buildings with a less strict regime , common rooms for pupils aged 13 and up were common in England but none of the secondary schools I attended in Scotland had them and the cane was never really used in England whereas in Scotland the belt or strap was still being used on the boys , not the girls.
    History in England taught English history very English not British whereas in Scotland British history was taught not Scottish but very British with the exact same things referred to in English schools as English being referred to in Scotland as British that’s why when I hear some people here in Scotland referring to British used in the media especially the BBC as just being another way of them saying English ,I say that is actually true.
    It was a subtle way of erasing Scottishness , just don’t mention Scotland.

    I changed schools 26 times between 1961 and 1973 I went to six different schools in Scotland and five different schools in England , one in Northern Ireland and four overseas , some of them i went to more than once , Scotland was never mentioned in any of the schools in England other pupils in those schools in England knew nothing about Scotland and couldn’t even give you a rough idea on a map where any of our cities or towns are , since then people in Scotland have changed the way they talk they are much more englified back then it was common that English people could not understand Scottish people who just talked too quickly for them to pick up what was being said , English people made fun of that.
    It took 14 hours back then to get from London to Dundee by train there were no regular flights and driving took even longer.

    Mr Mathieson says about his time in school,in Scotland
    “ We did not learn to think, critically or creatively, and knew nothing of biology, geology , politics, economics, sociology psychology or philosophy, I never heard of Galileo, Hutton, Hume, Darwin, evolution, or the Scottish Enlightenment. Boys were not taught to cook or type.
    There was no “personal and social education”, guidance teachers or careers advice. Each day started with a religious assembly which was a waste of time. I was bored,“

    AND he says this of his time at school in Scotland

    “ There was a kind of “political indoctrination” in that we learned: nothing of the Highland clearances, the Irish and Indian famines and uprisings, or treatment of native peoples. We were expected to revere the Empire and be proud of being British,
    residents of Canada, Australia and New Zealand were referred to as “Colonials”.

    I agree with him BUT may I add that these things were exactly the same in English schools .

    For Liam Kerr, education spokesman for the Scottish Conservatives and for Alan Mathieson , to say whether or not Scotland has a world leading education system h they would have to compare Scottish schools and universities with those in other countries around the world , NOT just those in England , it looks to me as if they only compare with England , am I right ?

    Given that more than three quarters of the countries in the world definitely do not have the financial resources that Scotland and England have I would think it very likely that Scotland and England are in the top quarter of education performance and success , is that world leading ? I suppose it is , but there are other countries leading the world too , let’s say there’s a group of countries leading the world not just one.

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    1. “For Liam Kerr, education spokesman for the Scottish Conservatives and for Alan Mathieson , to say whether or not Scotland has a world leading education system they would have to compare Scottish schools and universities with those in other countries around the world”

      The problem Liam Kerr has is that he cannot back up his claims without exposing both the truth and how ridiculous his party’s decision to pull the UK out of the EU in 2019 was.

      https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat produce annual data tables on the performance of EU member countries in terms of tertiary education, amongst other areas. For the ten consecutive years immediately prior to being pulled out of the EU against our will, Scotland topped those tables in terms of the percentage of ‘degree-bestowed’ adults in the workforce – in fact, it was the only country to exceed 50% annually. Whilst that admittedly doesn’t offer a world-wide comparison, I’d hazard a guess that it’s as close to it that is available.

      As far as I’m aware, the data used in those tables was gleaned from https://www.hesa.ac.uk/home and its European equivalents. A search of that website can drill down to student numbers and types of degrees attained in each of the four UK Education systems, thereby offering direct comparisons. I think that Mr Kerr assumes, to use the oft-repeated phrase, that our heads zip up at the back and that we wouldn’t be aware of this. Either that or he’s not aware of it himself – in which case he’s not fit to be in the position he is in.

      Quite probably the latter applies – I can’t think of one Tory (MP or MSP) who is fit for any position.

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  4. My experience of English education was much the same as TGC’s. And I do try to tell Scottish people who take the view that the English are contemptuous of Scots that they’re not – they’re totally ignorant about Scotland because it was only ever mentioned from the English pov. To be fair, Wales and Ireland were treated in exactly the same way. India was never mentioned at all. I only learned about the Amritsar massacre a few years back – and the Scottish potato famine a couple of years ago.

    That said, we were obviously about both the ‘annexation’ of Wales and the Union of Scotland. Fortunately the so-called “astute political move” on Wales was prefaced by a very Welsh teacher with “and do you know what that sneaky, scheming, conniving b*s***d did next?”

    When taught about the Union, it was never made clear how the ‘vote’ panned out. And I doubt most English are aware of the sovereignty of the people. When it came to what I’ve always referred to as the Uprisings of 1715 and 1745 my (English) History teacher acted as if I’d grown a 2nd head when I said “Well. They had a point didn’t they? The promises were made and never kept.” I do believe that he thought it was sweetly innocent that I actually thought they should be!

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  6. Pingback: Scotland topped EU tables of the percentage of ‘degree-bestowed’ adults – Talking-up Scotland

  7. Selective education. Only 10% went to university or could get a professional job.

    Now over 50% go to university. The most universities in the world pro rata. Colleges and apprenticeships. More additional needs aware. Teachers still need more diversity training but progress is now made. Life long learning based on the ability to learn not the ability to pay.

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  8. Yes, that’s how I remember my schooling in 1950’s Scotland: very little specifically about Scotland’s history or culture, although plenty about the Tudors, the War of the Roses etc and the ‘glories of empire’ (naturally without any of the shameful stuff). I’ve spent my adult life trying to catch up with our history. I grew up in an industrial town where the language of the streets was Lallans, but only Received English was permitted in school (on pain of the tawse for speaking Lallans in class). The only time Lallans was permitted in class was on Burns’ Birthday – one day in the year – when those of us who spoke Lallans outside the school got some entertainment listening to the posh pupils trying to sound Scottish. Another thing from that era was the civic buildings flew the Union Flag 364 days per year and the only time you saw a Saltire was on St Andrew’s Day. If all of that’s not cultural oppression I don’t know what is and it’s a bit of a miracle that we’ve managed to get our identity back, if not (yet) our political freedom.

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