Back in September last year, I went through to Edinburgh to meet Jenny Gilruth.

She had been made education secretary in March, a few months before I joined The Herald, and although this wasn’t going to be our first time speak to one another, it was the first time that was happening ‘on the record’.

We had an in-depth and wide-ranging discussion about the impact of Covid, the idea of closing the attainment gap, and the need to restore teachers’ faith in the government. It became a major, two-part interview, and I also wrote an additional piece giving some of my own thoughts.

As everyone knows, Jenny Gilruth used to be a teacher – and it showed. She had a grasp of issues that would have flown well over the head of almost any other politician in Holyrood and, as I pointed out at the time, her demeanour visibly changed when we moved past the basic and political questions and onto the proper education issues – a shift from a practiced politician’s smile to something much more human.

She was also fairly direct about some of the challenges she faced, even admitting that her government’s rhetoric around ‘closing the attainment gap’ had perhaps, at times, not been entirely helpful.

READ MORE: Interview pt1: Jenny Gilruth on her ambition for Scottish schools

READ MORE: Interview pt2: Jenny Gilruth on earning the trust of teachers

READ MORE: The two smiles of Jenny Gilruth

Ultimately, I was relatively impressed and thought that, if she could make good use of the goodwill she enjoyed from the profession, and at least come close to living up to people’s expectations, then Jenny Gilruth would be a better education secretary than a Somerville, Swinney, Constance, Russell and Hyslop – although one might question how much of an achievement that would really be.

But as I said at the time, her problem was also very obvious: the expectations on a former teacher were always going to greater, the bar always set higher.

In the months that followed, the enthusiasm and tentative optimism I had heard from teachers since Gilruth’s appointment transformed into disappointment, disillusionment and, in many cases, even anger.

Her response to the ongoing crisis of violence and aggression in classrooms was a disaster (for future reference: don’t respond to teachers being assaulted by suggesting that they just need more training) and there has been a feeling amongst both teachers and academics that she has put the brakes on much-needed reforms to schools.

By the end of December, I was writing that 2023 had been a wasted year for Scottish education. I also argued that the reason for this was, at least in part, the still considerable shadow of Nicola Sturgeon.

All of this was very much at the front of my mind as Gilruth began her speech at today’s teacher conference.

In a short opening speech (after which there were no questions from the floor) the cabinet secretary touched on a number of issues including teacher numbers, exam reform and the need to properly engage classroom teachers in any changes to the broader education system.

It wasn’t a speech entirely shorn of spin. The reference to funding for teachers completely ignored the fact that the SNP-led council in Scotland’s largest city has just confirmed that hundreds of teaching posts are going to go – and that’s just one of the cuts we’ve covered recently.

READ MORE: Was 2023 a Wasted Year for Scottish Education

READ MORE: Gilruth's plan for school behaviour is empty PR

When talking about teachers’ apparent misgivings about proposed education reform, which she said had been expressed to her during visits to schools, she didn’t allow for the possibility that this was more a reflection on the views of her party’s competence than on the principle of reforming the broader system.

She also raised questions about the structure and handling of the ongoing education reform process without any acknowledgement that the problems she identified were created by the political decision-making of her own party. This was, it should be noted, highlighted by Professor Walter Humes in the speech following the cabinet secretary, but by then she had left.

Overall, though, my impression was, once again, of someone who gets it.

But Gilruth is still a politician, and a member of a party that has been in government for a quite incredible period of time, and even in a room filled with teachers (rather than one packed with opposition politicians or political commentators) that was extremely apparent.

And here’s the thing: when your party has been running the show for nearly two decades, ‘getting it’ isn’t enough.

Gilruth can see the problems in Scottish education, and that means that she can also see which problems are rooted in mistakes made by her own party. This isn’t a particular criticism of the SNP – it is simply an inevitability for any party that has spent so long in government. She will hint at those failures in an interview, or in a room full of teachers, but that, it seems, is as far as she is willing, or able, or allowed to go.

That is a problem for everyone.

For Gilruth, and the SNP more broadly, it leaves them trapped in the shadow, and tied to the mistakes, of Scotland’s longest-serving First Minister – the one who promised to close the attainment gap and failed to do so, and who wanted to be judged on her record. Escaping that darkness is obviously risky, but staying in it is worse.

And for the rest of us – teachers, parents, pupils and more – it leaves us trapped in what Gilruth herself characterised as a perpetual cycle of reviews, reports, debates and, ultimately, little else.