Scottish school classrooms have been likened to “pressure cookers”, with teachers facing a growing list of challenges, MSPs heard.
The Scottish government has been urged to relieve the pressure on teachers by revealing deadlines for it fulfilling key education pledges.
In a Labour-led parliamentary debate, party education spokesperson Pam Duncan-Glancy said teachers were “at the end of their tether” and that there had been a deterioration in both pupil behaviour and - as shown by the recent Programme for International Student Assessment (Pisa) results - education standards.
However, education secretary Jenny Gilruth accused Ms Duncan-Glancy of failing to highlight any positives about Scottish education and of instigating a debate that would start a “political rammy”.
During yesterday’s debate, Ms Duncan-Glancy put forward a motion calling on the government to publish a timetable for fulfilling its education promises, such as “addressing the continued use of temporary teacher contracts improving workloads by increasing non-contact time for teachers; addressing the gaps in teacher provision in geographical and subject areas; delivering structural reforms, including to the Scottish Qualifications Authority and Education Scotland and meeting its commitment to offer free breakfasts in primary and special schools”.
She said: “Since I became Scottish Labour’s spokesperson on education [in April 2023], I have found that, no matter what stone I turn over or what corner I look around, there are deep and wide-ranging challenges, despite the best efforts of our outstanding teachers, the hard work of our pupils and the tenacity of our parents.”
She highlighted a quote from one teacher in the May 2023 National Discussion report on education, who said: “In my class of 30, four have ASD...three have longstanding...anxiety difficulties...one has been adopted, one is experiencing a form of trauma, one is a young carer, two others have severe learning difficulties.”
The teacher added that “I know exactly what support each child needs but can’t split myself 30 ways”.
Ms Duncan-Glancy said this example “not only sums up the complexities that our teachers face but shines a light on why classrooms are becoming a bit like pressure cookers”.
Teachers ‘overburdened with their workload’
She added: “With concerns bubbling up, they are vulnerable to overflowing. The result is behavioural concerns, teachers at the end of their tether and, yes, declining standards in education. We have to address all of that if we are to rebuild our education system and spread opportunity for all.”
Ms Duncan-Glancy cited the EIS teaching union’s Stand Up for Quality Education Campaign as “a fantastic example of an interconnected and systemic approach to delivering the education that we need”.
“Teachers are the architects of our children’s futures and the backbone of the system, and we need them to be at their best if we are to achieve our goal of opportunity for all,” she said.
“Right now, however, they are overburdened by an excessive workload, stretched across competing demands and tangled up in bureaucracy, all of which hinders their ability to deliver the quality education that they got into the profession to provide.”
Ms Duncan-Glancy added: “The solution cannot simply be, as the government has suggested previously, to teach teachers how to be better. Teachers are already excellent - I know that the cabinet secretary believes that - but they are too often going it alone.”
In her response, Ms Gilruth said: “There are many positives in Scotland’s education system, so it is somewhat disappointing that the Labour Party could not bring itself to acknowledge in the motion a single positive achievement by our pupils and teachers.”
She said the language of the motion would only “create a highly predictable political rammy”.
One recent dataset “strangely lacking from the Labour motion”, she said, was around achievement of Curriculum for Excellence levels (ACEL) in literacy and numeracy. This was published in December and, the education secretary added, showed “proportions of primary school children achieving the expected [CfE] levels are at record highs for children from both the most and the least deprived areas of Scotland”, with the data “predicated on the judgment of the teachers who we trust to teach our children and young people every day”.
Earlier in the day, at a meeting of the Scottish Parliament’s Education, Children and Young People Committee, Ms Gilruth had told MSPs that she was “very committed” to realising the government’s promise on reducing teachers’ weekly class-contact time by 90 minutes, a policy first set out in the 2021 SNP manifesto.
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