Home economics was responsible for one of the most memorable moments in all my time at secondary school. It was in S1 that I first cooked a proper meal by myself: a beef curry that was eventually dolloped into scuffed Tupperware after considerable direction from Mrs Evans, our redoubtable HE teacher. I carefully packed my little rectangular box in my bag and forgot all about it until I got home that night.

I can still remember the delight at the first forkful of that self-made dinner. I’d been tentative as I’d never eaten a curry before, but it was, to my great surprise, both edible and delicious. At a time when I was still getting used to my dauntingly big secondary school, it gave me a powerful sense of achievement that remains vivid to this day.

It is not always obvious at the time which moments or experiences at school will stay with you - for better or worse - decades later, but what is certain is that those experiences could emerge in a whole plethora of different activities.

Where school league tables fall short

Ken Muir provides another case in point: the former chief executive of the General Teaching Council for Scotland, who has now been entrusted with steering the reforms of the Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA) and Education Scotland, looks back on his own schooldays in this week’s Q&A. The teacher who stands out most in his memory does so because he introduced Muir to the joys of orienteering.

The huge diversity of experience on offer in schools is worth bearing in mind when weighing up the worth of school league tables.

The primary school league tables that appeared last week - just as many staff and pupils were returning from their summer break - caused a lot of upset. One of the central objections that teachers have is that such rankings are often based on a narrow set of criteria, which give a misleading picture and do not factor in much of what schools do. It is galling for teachers to see some media reports beckoning readers towards a list of “schools ranked best to worst” - the exact words used by at least one outlet. And especially so for those who know that their school is outstanding, despite it languishing around the “bottom” of such lists.

Some teachers who have contacted Tes Scotland in the past week found it hard to stomach any argument that such rankings would have a positive, motivational impact. Schools near the bottom of the list, one teacher said, were “being told on day one of term that we are failing”, based on a narrow and “ridiculous” verdict of success or otherwise.

“These measures do not take into account any of the other experiences that our pupils have had across the year,” said another teacher, recalling the array of achievements by P7s in recent years, including community work, performing in school shows and raising money for a range of charities.

Other teachers warned that league tables could even change schools’ priorities, pressurising them to do whatever it takes to get higher up specious rankings, rather than relying on “teacher judgement” - which those in power tell us is so important these days - to decide what matters most in improving their school.

Schools are not concerned whether the negative impact of narrow league tables should be blamed on the media outlets that pull them together or the governments that make it possible for them to do so - they care only about the potentially demoralising and distorting effect they can have on school life.

Muir believes there is a “huge lack of understanding” about what the role of a teacher entails and that teachers are “hugely undervalued and underrated”. When you see outstanding schools being shamed as the “worst” in Scotland, you can only nod in agreement.

@Henry_Hepburn

This article originally appeared in the 27 August 2021 issue under the headline “League tables are unfair - they don’t show all a school can offer”