Every young person will have the same opportunity to succeed, no
matter their background or where they live in Scotland, Education
Secretary Màiri McAllan has pledged, as she set out her
priorities for education.
In a statement to Parliament, Ms McAllan confirmed councils would
receive up to £2.8 million to help address school meal debt, to
ease the cost of living for families that need it most, while
work continues to expand Free School Meals.
A new £1 million pilot fund will support teachers taking up posts
in rural and island communities with relocation and housing
costs, to help attract teachers to hard-to-fill posts and
encourage them to remain long-term. This is alongside wider
ongoing national work to deliver a teacher job guarantee for a
minimum of three years for newly-qualified teachers, and reduce
class contact time.
Further plans will be brought forward shortly to help
newly-qualified primary teachers gain additional registration,
helping them transition into new roles, and to strengthen career
opportunities for pupil support assistants.
Ms McAllan also set out plans to improve attainment, attendance,
behaviour and curriculum, including streamlining guidance so that
councils and schools can deliver more consistently on national
policies.
Curriculum reforms, developed following the OECD's Review of
Scotland's Curriculum, will be delivered in partnership with
teachers, to ensure learners fully benefit from ongoing work to
improve the curriculum.
Public Service Reform will be central to tackling inconsistencies
in how national education policy is applied across the country,
with work underway alongside councils to streamline data use, cut
unnecessary bureaucracy and free up schools to focus on what
matters most to pupils.
Ms McAllan added:
There is already so much to celebrate in our education system
record levels of literacy and numeracy in our schools, increases
in exam passes across the board this year and more Scots gaining
places at university.
But I am clear we must raise standards and deliver excellence
across Scotland by focusing on the ABCs in our schools
attainment, attendance, behaviour and curriculum. We must ensure
every child regardless of where they live or whether they have an
additional support need, are supported to learn and thrive at
school.
We must seize the opportunity of Public Service Reform to truly
achieve this, by addressing the variability in education outcomes
across the country, improving data collection, enhancing
performance and accountability and empowering schools to invest
and take the decisions they need to support pupils.
As a Government we must also continue our work to cut the costs
of the school day for families that means more breakfast clubs,
expanding free school meals and clearing school meal debt.
The leadership I will offer as Education Secretary will always be
guided by the pursuit of excellence and equity. I commit to
working hand in hand with young people, their families, the
workforce, trade unions and local government to ensure every
child receives the highest standard of education.
Background
Programme for Government 2026 to
2031 - gov.scot
The Scottish Government is supporting local authorities who are
responsible for managing school meal debt to help families
struggling with these costs.
While recruitment of teachers is for councils as their employer,
the Scottish Government committed as part of the wider agreement to reduce class
contact time to provide additional support to rural and
island councils facing teacher recruitment challenges. The £1
million Teacher Recruitment Assistance Fund (TRAF) fund will
initially operate as a pilot, with monitoring and evaluation to
inform future funding decisions. It will be available to island
authorities as defined under the Islands (Scotland) Act 2018
and councils where at least 40% of the population is classified
as rural under the Scottish Government Urban-Rural
classification.
TheOECDcompleted an Independent review of Curriculum
for Excellence in 2021, which led to the Curriculum Improvement
Cycle. As part of the Curriculum Improvement Cycle
(CIC) co-design process, Education Scotland has shared
with councils early draft
samples from the new
curriculum so that educators have access to materials
that can help them understand how curriculum improvement work is
progressing. These materials
are being developed for distribution to
schools for the start
of the 2026-27 academic year. A
full draft technical Curriculum Framework will be shared in the
early autumn.
