Rennie: SNP could take over a century to close the attainment gap

Scottish Liberal Democrat education spokesperson Willie Rennie MSP has today said that it could take the SNP 113 years to close the attainment gap following new statistics which revealed how little progress the government has made in improving outcomes for the most disadvantaged children in the country.

In 2016, Nicola Sturgeon pledged to close the gap within a decade.

Scottish Liberal Democrats analysed the most recent figures on the attainment gap to determine how long it would take to close the various gaps in numeracy and literacy at the current rate of progress.

That analysis found that since Nicola Sturgeon’s pledge, the gap between children from the most and least deprived backgrounds achieving:

• Third Level or better in literacy at S3 has narrowed by a mere 0.9 percentage points - at this rate, it would take 113 years to close the current gap.
• CfE level in literacy in primary school has narrowed by just 1.9 percentage points - at this rate, it would take 85 years to close the gap.
• Third Level or better in numeracy at S3 has decreased by only 2.9 percentage points - at this rate, it would take 33 years to close the gap.

The attainment gap in numeracy at primary level actually grew last year by 0.4%.

Mr Rennie said:

“Nicola Sturgeon promised that her government would close the attainment gap by 2026. That deadline is fast approaching but the SNP are still a lifetime away from making it happen.

“On their watch, Scotland has tumbled down the international rankings and parents are extremely worried about what that means for their children’s futures.

“You only get one shot at school and these figures show that ministers are letting down a whole generation of pupils from poorer backgrounds.”