Consultation on the Improvement in Scottish Education Bill

School Board Elections

1. School Boards are largely advisory bodies made up of teachers, parents and co-opted members, with parents in the majority. They are an important focus for parental involvement in schools and the framework in place has ensured they work effectively. They have been in existence since 1989-90 and by May 1998 83% of local authority schools had a School Board.

2. Elections are held every two years to elect parent and teacher School Board members. Other members are then co-opted by the elected members. By-elections are held when insufficient numbers of parents are elected at the regular time, or when someone leaves the School Board between regular election times.

3. In 1998 the Scottish Office consulted parents, Boards and others who have an interest, on ways in which the role of parents in their children's education could be enhanced and how School Boards could be improved. Over 1,100 responses were received. Many people said that the School Board election process was too complicated and that as a result, parents were being deterred from putting themselves forward to serve on a School Board.

4. Under the proposals in the Bill the by-election stage would be removed in School Board elections, both after regular elections and when casual vacancies arise midterm. The regular election period would therefore be followed by co-option if not enough parent members were elected. If a School Board member leaves between election periods another member would also be co-opted until the next regular election period. An election would then be held for that post. The procedures for co-option would remain unchanged.

5. These new provisions would simplify the School Board election process and enable vacancies to be filled more quickly. It is important to stress that these provisions only affect the by-election stage - the regular election stage is to be retained. Scottish Ministers hope that by streamlining the election process more parents will be encouraged to become involved with School Boards.

6. This proposal is supported by the Scottish School Board Association.

Pre-School Education

1. Under current legislation local authorities have the power to provide education for children before they go to primary school. Until 1996, the level of pre-school provision varied considerably across Scotland. Since 1996 pre-school education has expanded, at first through a system of parental vouchers and more recently through direct grants to local authorities. Now almost every child in their pre-school year has access to a free part-time place. From August this year money will also become available to fund pre-school education for children following their third birthday.

2. The majority of pre-school places are being provided in local authority centres. Authorities are also encouraged to commission places from voluntary and private centres, and there are 622 such centres participating in the grant scheme.

3. Scottish Ministers hope that by 2002 the grant system will ensure that every child will have access to a free part-time pre-school place from the term following their third birthday until they reach the age at which they can start primary school.

A New Duty to Secure Provision of Pre-School Education

4. Scottish Ministers have used a grant system to achieve expansion of the pre-school service. When universal provision is achieved (or is very close to being achieved) they think it sensible to put resources for pre-school into the general resources which local authorities receive from central government. At that time the direct grant system will become unnecessary.

5. Scottish Ministers are confident that local authorities will continue to ensure that local children receive pre-school education, even when the resources are no longer 'ring fenced'. Nonetheless, Scottish Ministers think that access to pre-school education should be enshrined in law, in the same way as school education. That is why they propose a duty on local authorities to secure pre-school provision in their area to make clear what parents of eligible children can expect. This new duty will put pre-school education on the same footing as the rest of a child's education.

6. Scottish Ministers are committed to a diversity of provision in order that the needs and preferences of parents and children can be met. Local authorities will be responsible for the planning and co-ordination of pre-school education. At the same time the new legislation will be designed to ensure that innovative and flexible partnerships between public, private and voluntary sectors, which meet the needs of parents and children, can continue and flourish. That is why the duty is phrased in terms of 'securing' provision. The Bill will also give local authorities the explicit power to contract with third parties for pre-school provision.

Inspection of Pre-School Education Centres

7. Within the overall context of devolving responsibility for pre-school to local authorities, Scottish Ministers are committed to ensuring high standards of pre-school education across Scotland. Her Majesty's Inspectorate provides the national benchmark of quality in education and the legislation will embed the role of independent, expert inspection in law.

Guidance

8. Under these proposals Scottish Ministers would also intend to require that local authorities take account of guidance in planning and delivering pre-school education in their area. This guidance would be issued when the new provisions come into force.

9. Scottish Ministers will consult with local authorities and other interested parties on the contents of the guidance. Some parts of the guidance are likely to rely on existing published guidance (curriculum guidelines and guidance on planning). Other parts will build on the current requirements of grant, such as in the following example, which is for illustrative purposes only.

10. It will be useful to learn through the consultation process whether respondents feel that there is a need for additional guidance on other topics.

Placing Requests

1. To help raise standards of attainment in the first 3 years of primary school the Scottish Executive has set a national objective that by August 2001 children in P1, P2 and P3 will be taught in classes with a maximum of 30 pupils. Classes of more than 30 are permitted, but in that case an additional teacher is required. The maximum size of classes in P4 to P7 is limited to 33 under the present agreement made by the Scottish Joint Negotiating Committee for teachers.

2. In meeting this objective the Scottish Executive has asked that, wherever possible, authorities should aim to maintain parental choice at the current level. More than £50 million is being made available over the next three years to pay for additional teachers and to extend popular schools.

3. There are a number of solutions that a local authority can adopt to meet the class size target while still maintaining parental choice in a popular school. For instance, a school might create additional classes (either through spare capacity or building works) or appoint another teacher to team-teach.

4. However, some solutions would have the effect of creating spare places in lower classes (the class would have less than 30 pupils) which if filled by placing requests could not be accommodated without the creation of additional classes in later years. For example;

An authority runs a three-stream primary school with an annual intake of 99. The school has some spare accommodation and so decides to split the intake into 4 classes creating an additional class for each of the first three years. Each stage now has 3 classes of 25 and one class of 24. However, this creates 21 unfilled places (5 in three classes and 6 in the fourth). If any of these unfilled places are filled by placing requests, additional classes would have to be created at P4 and in the following years.

5. The existing legislation allows a placing request to be refused if there is no space or if creating an additional place would require additional resources, for instance to build a classroom or to recruit an extra teacher. However, it is not clear whether in considering placing requests the authority can look beyond the current year to the effect in future years of granting a request.

6. To address this problem, the Bill would allow authorities to refuse a placing request if placing the child in the school would require the authority to create an extra class or to employ an additional teacher in a later year. This will allow classes to be created which have less than the maximum of 30.