Calls are growing for an overhaul of leadership at the Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA) as Scotland’s new qualifications body comes into being next year.
Council education leads, secondary school leaders and the children’s commissioner all warn in newly published feedback on the government’s education bill that if the new body of Qualifications Scotland is led entirely by the same people, the Scottish government’s ongoing education reforms will not lead to meaningful change.
They make the case for change at the top so that Qualifications Scotland - due to come into place from autumn 2025 - can benefit from “new perspectives and innovative thinking”, as West Dunbartonshire Council education officer Murray Hanvey puts it.
Call for ‘open and competitive appointments’
He says this must be “facilitated by open and competitive appointments to senior positions”.
Mr Hanvey acknowledges that “it is important to retain the expertise and experience of the current SQA body”, but says “a wholesale transfer of personnel to Qualifications Scotland would undermine the reform process”.
In Inverclyde Council education service’s feedback on the Scotland (Education) Bill - which sets out the plans to replace the SQA with Qualifications Scotland and also to establish the independence of the inspectorate - head of education Michael Roach also criticises the plans.
He says “there is a danger” that the reform leads only to “structure change”: “the same people will still be involved…leading to the same approach by another name”.
Vivienne Cross, head of education at Moray Council, says: “A change of name and structure isn’t sufficient in response to [the Muir report] and [recommendations from the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD)] - if everything else stays the same, this is not radical reform.”
She adds that the government’s “no-compulsory-redundancies announcement reinforced that name and structures [were] changing but with the same people involved”, asking: “How will the current system be different with the same people leading in senior roles?”
Ms Cross stresses: “Scottish education requires a more significant change in its qualifications and national agency model.”
Scepticism around new qualifications body
Megan Farr, a policy officer for the office of the Children and Young People’s Commissioner Scotland, says its young advisers “were sceptical about the potential for the new [Qualifications Scotland] to be different from the SQA, particularly given that most leadership positions will be filled by existing SQA staff”.
School Leaders Scotland (SLS) made a similar call in its submission to the Scottish Parliament’s Education, Children and Young People Committee, which called for views after the new bill was published. The SLS response was shared exclusively with Tes Scotland last week, as was the response from education directors’ body ADES.
SLS says: “There must be new blood and new thinking, and this must be seen by the open, competitive appointment to senior posts in Qualifications Scotland. We therefore question why the chair of the SQA will automatically become the chair of Qualifications Scotland.”
ADES says: ”The announcement of ‘no compulsory redundancies’ reinforced that job titles and structures may be changing but the same people will still be involved, leading to the criticism that the process is a simple means of ‘moving the deckchairs’.”
The Scottish government announced its plans to replace the SQA after the publication of the OECD’s Curriculum for Excellence (CfE) review in 2021, which found a disconnect between traditional, exam-heavy qualifications and CfE’s goals.
However, the SQA was under pressure before the OECD report was published, over its handling of the way students were assessed during the pandemic. There was an outcry when schools’ past performances were used to alter grades; after results were released in August 2020, the government had to scrap the system of moderation set up by the SQA.
SQA promising ‘tangible difference’
Writing in Tes Scotland in June, after the publication of the education bill, SQA chief executive Fiona Robertson, along with SQA chair Shirley Rogers, said the creation of Qualifications Scotland ”must be much more than a name change or rebrand”.
Everyone working with the new body would “see and feel a tangible difference”: “each and every” educator and learner would have “the opportunity to have their voice heard and to inform the decisions, products and services of Qualifications Scotland”.
A Scottish government spokesperson said: “The cabinet secretary looks forward to engaging with the education and skills committee as part of its evidence gathering sessions on the bill. Ms Gilruth is acutely aware of the need for the new qualifications body to evidence humility in its approach, to win back the credibility which was undoubtedly damaged during the Covid pandemic.”
The spokesperson added: “That is why the SQA chair, appointed in December 2023, has been tasked with leading the organisation through reform and the establishment of Qualifications Scotland. A key part of this will be to advise on how the organisational and leadership structures of Qualifications Scotland can best deliver this government’s reform commitments.”
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