Chamber and committees

It mentions “leaders” and “team managers”. You cannot identify an individual from that.

You also asked for this to be redacted from page 48:

“entirely new qualifications team. I have no confidence in the current leadership structure.”

Does that identify an individual member of SQA staff? It is speaking about the leadership structure.

I was contacted by a faculty head who has tried to use that. Will you respond to his concerns, which I will quote? He said:

“History teachers from my school and others I know have emailed the dedicated email address with little resolution to their queries.”

He continued:

“Responses to date have said that the specific question can’t be answered”

and that, instead,

“text which feels like an automated response with links to “Understanding Standards” and course reports”

is sent on, although they have already seen and read those things.

He then communicated with the escalated email address. The SQA responded after two weeks and apologised for the delay—the response should have come within five days—but all the SQA sent was three bullet points and another hyperlink. In the teacher’s response to that, he said:

“If this is an escalated response, I dread to think what others are receiving. It’s clear to see the email address service is nothing more than a publicity stunt, and the SQA have no interest in providing help to teachers across the country, who are on their knees and crying out for help.”

What is your response to a faculty head who is raising those concerns about the measures that you have put in place to deal with exactly the problems that he and his team are experiencing?

Thank you very much.

That concludes the public part of our proceedings.

Good morning and welcome to the fourth meeting in 2025 of the Education, Children and Young People Committee.

I welcome Keith Brown, who is joining us as a committee member and replacing our previous colleague, Evelyn Tweed. On behalf of the committee, I thank Evelyn for her work as deputy convener and as a conscientious member of the committee.

As this is his first meeting as a committee member, I invite Keith to declare any relevant interests.

A lot of other members want to come in, and there are issues that I want to come back to.

Finally, what has the SQA’s response been to your survey and its responses? In an update to SATH members on your meeting with the SQA, you said:

“Reopening the investigation, admission of fault or changes to the pupil grades for 2024 were not on the table.”

Therefore, the SQA has parked the issue.

Please say so, if you cannot answer this, because I know that you are here as teachers and representatives of your profession, but what was the SQA’s response to the survey being published and then removed because some names had not been redacted? Was it reasonable, and did it say, “You are all volunteers and these things happen”? Were the response to your survey, and its issues with it, acceptable or reasonable?

Let us get into the “Understanding standards” sessions, which I mentioned in my opening questions. I have received quite a lot of correspondence about them over the weekend and earlier this week.

I want to get this right in my head. The SQA sent out information to the effect that it was using those events as one of three additional things that it would take forward to ensure that more support and resources were available into the new year for teachers and lecturers who are preparing candidates for higher history in 2025.

In today’s evidence session, we have been looking back a lot, but we are now just months away from this year’s cohort going through the exam process. Some parents are raising with me concerns that the problems of last year’s exam have not been resolved, so they are worried about this year’s cohort.

As I understand it, the “Understanding standards” sessions have not gone down particularly well. It has been raised with me that not everyone could get to the first of the two sessions, and some of the important issues that were raised at session 1 were not repeated at session 2. Therefore, there is a mixture of people who have the information and people who do not. Worryingly, information that was promised as part of the sessions has still not been made available some time later.

Is that a fair appraisal of teachers’ concerns? They went along to the events in good faith. Another one is scheduled, I think—

Okay. As I said, I find that concerning. We will hear what other members think. We will come back to those points, but I will now bring in Ross Greer.

So you have previously done a survey, which the SQA looked at, and it then asked you not to publish it.

Did she engage?

The qualifications manager who, for many months, has been heavily involved in that issue and the exam issues was simply listening rather than trying to put across what she and members of her team would seek to give you to help you with your students.