Marking the success of Argyll and Bute’s young people was top of the agenda at today’s Community Services Committee as councillors approved an update to the council’s Education Strategic Plan for 2022-24.
The Strategic Plan highlights a range of information about the work of the education service for parents, pupils, staff and other key stakeholders.
The document sets out the council’s top priorities, which are centred around raising attainment, improving outcomes and ensuring every child and young person has the same opportunity to succeed.
It includes the Progress and Impact Report 2022-2023 that outlines the success of the work done by the education service, highlights the achievements of Argyll and Bute’s young people and recognises the contribution that the area’s teachers and support staff have made.
The impact report examines progress made across key areas such as improvements in children’s health and wellbeing, closing the attainment gap, enhancing skills and positive leaver destinations for young people, and improving attainment, particularly in literacy and numeracy.
The education service has successfully progressed a wide range of initiatives and projects over the past year. These have included a project aimed at using technology to enhance literacy skills for young people with additional support needs, and a partnership with Highland Council to deliver online Gaelic language lessons with professional learning for practitioners.
A peer mentoring programme, Mentors in Violence Prevention, which gives young people the chance to explore the attitudes that underpin gender-based violence was launched and a project for measuring health and wellbeing in schools was successfully piloted.
Councillor Yvonne McNeilly, the Policy Lead for Education, said: “Our communities across Argyll and Bute can be extremely proud of the many successes our schools and young people have had in session 2022-2023, a number of which have resulted in awards and accolades locally, nationally and internationally.
“As always, I’m so impressed by the efforts of our schools in preparing our children and young people to progress toward their future careers and supporting the development of knowledge, skills and abilities.
“At a time when Scottish education is going through a period of significant reform, our updated plan for 2022-24 outlines the committed approach our Education Service is taking to delivering improved outcomes for all our children, young people, their families and communities.”