Council approves plans for improvements in equity and attainment in Aberdeen schools

01 June 2017

Aberdeen City councillors today (Thursday 1 June) approved plans to improve equity and attainment in Aberdeen schools in line with the National Improvement Framework (NIF).

A plan, aligned to the national Excellence and Equity Agenda which aims to achieve equity in educational outcomes for all children and young people irrespective of their economic background, will be submitted to the Scottish Government in August following a period of consultation.

Gayle Gorman, Director of Education and Children’s Services, said: “A draft NIF plan has been developed and will be refined as year-end data becomes available We have already aligned our Local Authority Business Plan, the Directorate Service Plan with the priorities contained in the NIF while we have also revised our current School Improvement Planning process to align with statutory guidance.

“We have worked closely Education Scotland to support schools to produce robust and clear plans. We routinely update our Pupil Equity Funding booklet to help our schools successfully obtain funding to help children most affected by the poverty related attainment gap. “

Ms Gorman added: “In addition, all of our bids for national funding for interventions at seven of our attainment challenge schools have been successful over the last two years with the recipients receiving £193,000 in total to enable improvements. These schools will remain part of the initiative for 2017/18”

The National Improvement Framework identifies 4 key priorities for action:

· Improvement in attainment, particularly literacy and numeracy

· Closing the attainment gap between most and least disadvantaged children

· Improvement in children and young people’s health and wellbeing

· Improvement in employability skills and sustained, positive school leaver destinations for all young people.