A private school has been criticised for boasting about 100 per cent pass rates for its pupils, based on teachers’ estimates.
St Aloysius, in Glasgow, said on Facebook “a robust and fair process” had led to 100 per cent of their students passing their Advanced Highers, while 99.8 per cent passed Highers and 99 per cent passed National 5s.
Headteacher Matthew Bartlett said: “Having overseen a robust and fair process at the college, which was based on reviewing the evidence of student course work…and reflected the vast amount of teacher experience of assessing young people, I am delighted that the Scottish Government has fully recognised students’ efforts.”
But expert Lindsay Paterson, professor of education policy at Edinburgh University, said: “This is about misuse of publicity. I’m not criticising the school but the PR officer for the school.
“I have great respect for St Aloysius, which I think is an outstanding school, but I do think the use of these statistics is disingenuous.”
Scottish Labour leader Richard Leonard said: “This illustrates just how badly the original SQA awards discriminated against schools from deprived communities and in favour of those from privileged backgrounds.
"John Swinney’s U-turn mitigated that but the mess he created still ended up favouring the better off.”
St Aloysius did not respond to our request for a comment.
