Pisa rankings suggest Curriculum for Excellence could fit category of ‘sounds good, but works less well in practice’
Published 19th Oct 2026, 06:01 BST
It is often the case that a system which sounds good in theory works less well in practice. Sixteen years since it was introduced to Scotland’s schools, it seems the much-maligned Curriculum for Excellence may fit this description.
The latest Programme for International Student Assessment (Pisa) last month showed pupils in Scotland falling behind England in reading, maths and science tests.
The international study, which is published every three years, records the knowledge and skills of more than 760,000 children from 91 countries.
In the wake of the latest results, Education Secretary Mairi McAllan said she is now overseeing changes that will be “the largest reform to Curriculum for Excellence since it was introduced in 2010”. These changes, she added, “are about clarifying the role of knowledge in our curriculum”.
Ms McAllan’s response to the results showed a willingness to learn lessons on where our education system is failing our children.
However, her predecessor, current Deputy First Minister Jenny Gilruth, has now called into question the methodology behind the Pisa study, which has been co-ordinated by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) since 2000.
Ms Gilruth, who is a former teacher, suggested English pupils had only performed better than their Scottish counterparts because of a “shallow” focus on rote learning.
Meanwhile, Andrea Bradley, general secretary of Scotland’s biggest teaching union the Educational Institute of Scotland, called for “better perspective”.
The OECD, Ms Bradley said, had done a “really good marketing job” in “making the world believe” Pisa is a good measure of systems’ performance.
Perhaps this is a view shared by many in Scotland’s education establishment.
However, the Occam’s razor theory - that the most obvious explanation is probably the right one - would suggest that shifting focus away from knowledge and facts was not such a good idea after all.