Scottish teachers will find out “definitively” what is going to happen with the 2021 exams before the October holidays, education secretary John Swinney told the Scottish Parliament’s Education and Skills Committee today.

Secondary school staff, meanwhile, have been increasingly venting their frustration about the lack of guidance on what exactly should be studied by senior students this year, given the teaching time lost to lockdown, as well as the struggle to deliver some subjects, such as PE, science and home economics, with current safety regulations in place.

Today, the message from Mr Swinney was that teachers were going to have to wait even longer for clarity, but when it finally came they would get everything they needed to know in one document.

Coronavirus: Schools await guidance for the year ahead

The wide-ranging discussion at the committee also covered teacher absence rates, teacher numbers and the government’s promise to put a counsellor in every secondary.

Here are some of the key points:

• Decisions on modification to courses and the 2021 exam diet will be published before the October break - the Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA) was supposed to give teachers guidance on changes to exams and courses in the week beginning 31 August, but Mr Swinney said he had asked the SQA to “pause” publication until Professor Mark Priestley’s review of this year’s results debacle is published. That review is expected at the end of this month; the October holidays start in some parts of Scotland on 2 October.
• All guidance for teachers of practical subjects - music, drama, home economics and PE - will be out by the end of the week, with fresh Education Scotland advice for the latter two subjects already available.
• Currently, around 2 per cent of school staff are off at any given time for coronavirus-related reasons, including because they have been instructed to isolate. Figures on pupil absence are routinely published, but not teacher absence.
• An extra 1,118 teachers have been employed by councils, and discussions are underway with another 250 teachers. Mr Swinney also said that the General Teaching Council for Scotland is contacting 2,000 to 2,500 teachers whose registration recently lapsed to see if they would be willing to return to the profession. The Scottish government promised an extra 1,400 teachers when it said schools would reopen full-time.
• The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) review of Curriculum for Excellence is due to get underway “imminently”.
• Mr Swinney defended the appeals process for this summer’s SQA results, even though the lack of a direct right to appeal for students has been criticised by the children’s commissioner and human rights experts, as well as young people themselves, and their families
• The education secretary put the rises in exam pass rates this year - with results ultimately based on teachers’ estimated grades - down to how qualifications standards are understood. He said that if the system had to rely on teacher estimates in the future, “a deep understanding of standards” would have to be ensured.
• There will be a counsellor in every secondary by the end of October. Originally counsellors were due to be in place this month
• Outdoor contact sports are permitted - there is nothing in the current guidance that means children cannot play football outside at school.