Cleverest Scottish pupils 'a year behind on science' compared to before SNP taking power

The cleverest Scottish schoolchildren are the equivalent of a year’s worth of schooling behind at science compared to before the SNP took power, according damning research.

Think tank the Sutton Trust found that there was no area where the brightest Scottish 15-year-olds “really excel”, with their weaknesses including a “pronounced and sustained decline” in their performance at science since 2006.

Its research concluded that the decline was “equivalent to around a year of schooling” and they were “trailing behind the performance of able pupils in England in most subject areas.”

The study discovered bright children from poor backgrounds in Scotland lag behind their wealthy classmates by more than two-and-a-half years by the time they reach 15.

Clever youngsters from deprived backgrounds were 31 months behind their wealthy peers at mathematics and science and 26 months behind for reading.

Although the gaps were even larger south of the Border, the report found that bright pupils from both deprived and wealthy backgrounds performed better in English schools in all three core subjects.

The study noted with concern that the mathematics skills of Scotland’s brightest children have declined since 2009, two years after the SNP took power.

The Sutton Trust obtained the findings by further analysing the results of last December’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) survey, which caused political uproar.

Scotland’s education system recorded its worst ever performance, tumbling down league tables for maths, reading and science when compared to 34 other developed countries and the UK’s three other home nations.

The think tank, which aims to improve social mobility, called for ring-fenced funding for high-achieving pupils to widen access to the best jobs and universities.

Nicola Sturgeon has said she wants to be judged by her success in closing the “attainment gap” between the poorest and wealthiest pupils and Scottish Labour said the SNP “should be ashamed of these figures.”

Iain Gray, the party’s education spokesman, said: “Nicola Sturgeon said education would be the defining priority of her government; she put her top minister in charge of it and has announced a stream of schemes but the gap between the richest and the poorest most able pupils is more than two and a half years. 

“In Scotland today how much money you have means that, even for the ablest pupils, they can be two and a half years behind the richest pupils in key subjects like maths and science. That is a scandal and a ticking timebomb for our economy.”

The study said it compared the PISA test scores of clever children with parents working in occupations such as managers, doctors and lawyers with those whose mothers and fathers work in relatively unskilled jobs like cleaners and waiters.

It found that the performance of bright Scottish pupils had suffered a sharp decline at science since 2006 and this was driven by lower scores recorded by those from the wealthiest backgrounds.

Scotland’s performance was “broadly comparable” to England’s in 2006 but the cleverest 10 per cent Scottish children are now significantly behind their English peers.

Although the research found a sharp drop in the difference in reading performance between clever Scottish children from wealthy and poor backgrounds, it again said this was thanks to a large drop in the scores of the rich youngsters rather deprived youngsters doing better.

A Scottish Government spokesman said: “ We welcome this research. It adds to our understanding of some of the challenges we want to address in our determination to close the attainment gap over the next ten years.

“This government is already taking action to ensure that every child, no matter their background, has the chance to succeed by implementing a range of measures to strengthen our education system and to give every child an equal chance of going to university.”