Explained: How the Scottish Government spins education stats

We have recently seen the biggest ever reduction in the attainment gap on literacy and numeracy in primary schools in a single year and we are seeing record proportions of school leavers going on to positive destinations including work, training or further study.”

This comment makes four specific claims, and it caught my eye because each one is a good example of how this government – and indeed any government – tries to put a positive spin on statistics.

CLAIM: the overall pass rate for National 5, Highers and Advanced Highers is up from the pre-pandemic level

In the simplest possible terms, this claim is absolutely correct. At all three levels, the overall pass rate was higher in 2023 than it had been in 2019, the last year before the Covid pandemic struck; however, things change if we even slightly broaden our definition of the term “the pre-pandemic level”.

At National 5, the 2023 pass rate was higher than the 2019 figure, but it was lower than it had been in 2016 and 2017.

For Highers, although the 2023 pass rate is several percentage points higher than the levels seen in 2019, it is worth noting that there had also been a significant dip in the pass rate that year. The figure now is the same as it was in 2018, and lower than it was in the period 2014-2017.

We see the same pattern for Advanced Highers, where the pass rate in 2023 exceeded that from 2019, but fell short of the figures from 2014-2018.

CLAIM: increases in the pass rates for Higher Maths, Biology, Chemistry and Physics

For biology, chemistry and physics this claim is absolutely true. Pass rates in all three sciences are higher than pre-pandemic levels, although care should perhaps be taken in drawing a direct comparison given that Covid-era adjustments to courses – in the case of sciences, the removal of the coursework assignment from the assessment requirements – were still in place last year.

There’s also a good reason that this claim is restricted to Higher stats – at National 5 level, the Physics pass rate in 2023 was lower than it had been in 2019.

As for maths, the basic claim – that Higher pass rates have increased – is accurate so long as the comparison is restricted to 2019, but it stops being true once we take the pass rates from preceding pre-pandemic years into account, because the pass rates in 2016, 2017 and 2018 were higher than they are now.

Something else to consider when looking at the maths stats is that a whole new course was introduced a couple of years ago, and this could also be having an effect on the overall pass rate statistics. Higher Applications of Maths was introduced in 2022 and, in the first year, 870 students – who may otherwise have attempted Higher Maths – were entered for the course. Last year, that number jumped to 1615. To what extent could the increase in Higher Maths pass rates between 2019 and 2023 be explained by the fact that some students who would have struggled with the course are now likely to be completely a more appropriate and accessible option?

CLAIM: biggest ever reduction in the attainment gap on literacy and numeracy in primary schools in a single year

According to official statistics, this claim is true for primary reading, writing, listening & talking, combined literacy, and combined numeracy – but an enormous caveat is required.

The government’s claim of the ‘biggest ever reduction’ is only true because there had previously been an enormous jump in literacy and numeracy attainment gaps. For example, if we look at combined primary school reading statistics, we can see that between 2019 and 2021 (no data was collected in 2020) the gap between the richest and poorest pupils increased from 17.1 to 21.3 percentage points, with the same pattern seen across writing, listening & talking, combined literacy and combined numeracy.

Another important factor in the ‘biggest ever reduction’ is that, in previous years, the government had never managed to reduced the gap by more than a minimal amount. For the combined primary school statistics, the previous record for the ‘biggest ever reduction’ in a single year was just 1.1 percentage point, so exceeding this figure is, perhaps, not quite the achievement that is being claimed.

CLAIM: record proportions of school leavers going on to positive destinations including work, training or further study

This is absolutely true. Back in 2010, 87.7 school leavers went on to a positive destination; in 2022, that figure stood at 95.7%, which was the highest on record.

But while the percentages are clear, the definitions are more of a problem. We know, for example, that 25.1% of school leavers went on to employment in 2022, but we don’t know anything about the quality of that employment. We do know, however, that the government includes zero hours contracts in this statistic, which seems a questionable decision given that such jobs have previously been described as “exploitative”.

There are other questions to ask about just how ‘positive’ some of the destinations might be.

Imagine you are a hugely able and hard-working student who has always done well in school. You are going into fifth year and your ambition is to become a doctor. All of your teachers expect you to get the grades you need to achieve this dream – but then something goes wrong. Perhaps you become ill, or suffer the loss of a family member, or have to move home, or any number of other things. As a result of this, your education is disrupted, the system fails to adapt quickly enough, and you end up failing some or all of your exams. In the end, you leave school with few qualifications, and have little option but to accept a minimum wage, zero hours contract job.

Under those circumstances, you are counted as having achieved a positive destination. Although most people would recognise that this is not a particularly accurate way to categorise your situation, a government press release will make no such distinction.