Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee
Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills submission of 19 August 2021
PE1879/A - Provide an accessible and professionally developed learning and teaching resource on Israel and Palestine
I am writing in response to a request made for the Scottish Government’s views on the action called for in the above petition.
The development of an educational resource around Israel and Palestine began in 2015 and followed a much publicised incident involving a primary school homework exercise . A working group was established to scope out appropriate materials to support practitioners to deliver learning on the conflict and issues around Israel and Palestine.
In 2017, an initial set of resources was made available (on a password protected basis) as a pilot on Education Scotland’s national learning platform (GLOW). This pilot allowed practitioners to comment on the resources to further inform their development.
In the autumn of 2017, all interested stakeholders were invited to comment further on the resources in meetings and by correspondence, in order to obtain the agreement of key stakeholders as to the content of the resources. This process highlighted the challenging and complex nature of the subject matter.
By February 2018, it was apparent that the consensus sought by Education Scotland, could not be achieved. Education Scotland explored the possibility of taking ownership of the resources to develop them further and make them available on GLOW. This was agreeable to the eight local authorities involved in the development of the resources. However, the Educational Institute of Scotland (EIS) indicated that they would not be content with this approach. In May 2018, the EIS offered to publish the resources on their website, based on their assertion that they were a joint owner of the resources.
The Scottish Government and Education Scotland agreed to the EIS proposal and the resource was published by the EIS where it remains.
In light of the lack of consensus across stakeholders, and the EIS publishing the resource on a publicly available platform, the Scottish Government and Education Scotland concluded that the matter was closed.
The record of the development of the resources, stakeholder views on the resources and - ultimately - the decision to place the resources on the EIS website - is contained in numerous FOI responses available from the Scottish Government website at: http://www.gov.scot/foi-responses
Curriculum for Excellence (CfE) is a framework which allows practitioners and schools to develop curricula informed by the local needs of learners. There is, therefore, no set of topics schools are obligated to deliver learning on. Both the Scottish Government and Education Scotland appreciate the importance of ensuring that educators have access to high quality and relevant resources to deliver learning experiences on complex and on-going issues. Educators should be empowered to explore such issues with learners in a balanced, informed and sensitive manner.
Education Scotland sought to facilitate the development and delivery of a set of balanced and useful resources to support practitioners, but it did not prove possible to develop such a resource which was agreeable to stakeholders. As with any resource, developed by Education Scotland or any other party, it is for local authorities and individual schools to determine whether and how they wish to use such resources.
As stated above, the resources are available online and to all schools via the EIS website, and the Scottish Government and Education Scotland consider that their involvement in the resources has now closed.