The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
Huge online document for teachers was necessary, MSPs told
The boss of Scotland’s national education body has told MSPs that a huge online document for teachers explaining curriculum reforms was necessary.
Education Scotland’s Bill Maxwell told Holyrood’s education committee large parts of the 20,000-page guidance was “appropriate” at the time.
Concern about the Curriculum for Excellence (CfE) advice was raised last year by teacher unions, who believed the document overwhelmed teachers with unnecessary and unclear guidance.
Mr Maxwell defended its publication as MSPs quizzed representatives of the Curriculum for Excellence board on how such a high volume of advice had been allowed to build up.
Asked by Labour MSP Johann Lamont whether the thousands of pages were necessary, he said: “Large parts of it were.”
He said: “I would argue much of it was an appropriate response ... when it was requested, and served a useful purpose.
He explained that in the early days “we were modelling learner journeys before the new curriculum model existed”, so there was some guidance about what a new system would look like. He said such models “can disappear” as “more practical” real life examples emerge.
Seamus Searson, general secretary of the Scottish Secondary Teachers’ Association, said teachers’ voices must also be heard more.
He said: “We’re one voice in a number of voices there. It doesn’t really give the prominence of the profession in some of the decisionmaking. If you take, for example, the issues of workload and the changes to the national qualifications, the unions pursued those matters outside of the CfE management board to make those changes.”