Chamber and committees

The National Upskilling Plan for Computing Science teachers is a multi-year upskilling programme to support teachers keep pace with this fast-changing subject area. As this is a core tenet of STACS aims and deliverables, the Scottish Government will continue to support this for the duration of the grant funding arrangement with STACS until 2026-7.

Although the number of individual Computing Science teachers visiting the website is not tracked, the STACS website is an important resource for the Computing Science community. 490 Computing Science teachers are members of the STACS website and have access to the full set of resources. Since launching in 2022 the website has had 53,000 unique visits.

Funding was allocated to Local Authorities on behalf of 304 secondary schools for computing science hardware on a demand-led basis. Local Authorities distributed funding on behalf of the Scottish Government, with the total claimed at approximately £730,000.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-23510 on 19 December 2023. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers .

The Scottish Government continues to provide £100,000 annual funding to enable CELCIS to support the facilitation of a Virtual Head Teacher network. There are currently 18 virtual head teachers (or equivalent) who are members of the network with a standing offer of support to other local authorities who are considering implementing the role. The network has recently been expanded to include two Attainment Advisers from Education Scotland to offer additional support to the network and virtual head teachers.

Funding is provided to CELCIS for them to facilitate, support and manage a network of Virtual Head Teachers. This includes undertaking research and evaluation around the development of the role in Scotland and how it can help improve the lives and education outcomes of care experienced young people. Decisions around the introduction of the role remain with each individual local authority.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-25147 on 21 February 2024. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers .

In the information held by the Scottish Government, teaching posts are classified into three employment types: Permanent, Temporary, and Temporary-Teacher Induction Scheme. For the purposes of this response, teachers on the Teacher Induction Scheme have been included in the Temporary category.

Teachers may be employed on a permanent contract but be categorised as Temporary if they are working in a post classified as a temporary employment type.

The following table shows the percentage of permanent and temporary full-time equivalent (FTE) teacher posts across all sectors (Primary, Secondary, Special and Centrally Employed) from 2010.

Percentage of teachers (FTE) with Permanent and Temporary posts

A member of the Scottish Youth Parliament attended the relationships and behaviour summit held on 25 October, on relationships and behaviour approaches.

All three summits included representatives from a range of children’s and young people’s organisations.

The Scottish Government is considering the approach to publication of the strategic framework and plan for the early learning and school age childcare profession in light of the new childcare commitments included in the Programme for Government 2023-24 and will provide an update in due course.

We are continuing to work with the Framework Steering Group and other partners to support delivery of the actions developed as part of the original plan. We have, for example, already developed a range of new learning resources, implemented a Protecting Vulnerable Groups (PVG) fee waiver, released new mental health and wellbeing resources for the workforce and will shortly launch a new national portal for professional learning.

We are also continuing to support the profession by providing local authorities with an additional £16 million to deliver the Programme for Government commitment to increase pay to £12 per hour for staff in the Private Voluntary and Independent (PVI) sector who are delivering funded early learning and childcare from April 2024. This demonstrates our commitment to the Fair Work agenda, as we remain the only part of the UK to pay ELC staff in the PVI sector the real Living Wage.

It is not the case that 10% of children are not registered to receive their entitlement to funded early learning and childcare (ELC). The 2023 ELC Census showed an estimated uptake rate of 97% for eligible three and four year olds, and an uptake rate of 52% for eligible 2 year olds. Improvement Service data from September 2023 showed that 98% of children registered for funded ELC were reported to be accessing more than 600 hours, and 90% of registered children were accessing the full 1140 funded hours. This is not the same as 10% of children not being registered for funded ELC.

Families are not required to use the full 1140 entitlement. A 2022 parent survey found that when families were not using their full entitlement, this was often through choice. Typically, they did not need or want the full entitlement, or decided they did not wish to put their child in nursery for so many hours. However, around a fifth of those not using the full entitlement said they could not get the sessions they wanted at their preferred setting. We continue to work with local authorities to ensure that funded ELC hours are flexible and accessible to families.