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Scottish Government officials have engaged with the key stakeholder groups in the home education community, as well as local authorities, throughout the process of updating the home education guidance. Part of this engagement involved a consultation exercise with stakeholders, of which the published analysis and a list of stakeholders who responded can be found here: Home education guidance: consultation analysis - gov.scot (www.gov.scot) . Officials continue to develop plans for engagement ahead of publication this year.

As indicated in the answer to S6W- 24966, we asked the local authorities that did not maintain teacher numbers in the 2023 teacher census to provide an explanation for these reductions and any mitigating circumstances they wished to put forward.

The commitment to develop a new digital strategy for education was made in the 2023 Programme for Government and is expected to complete by Autumn 2024.

The Family Support Commissioning and Procurement Short Life Working Group was a subset of the Family Support Advisory Group, set up to provide recommendations on the key theme of holistic family support. Following task completion, engagement on this issue has reverted to the Family Support Advisory Group, as well as engagement with broader stakeholders as part of delivery of the Whole Family Wellbeing Programme.

The Parental Involvement Act Statutory Guidance Working Group was set up to refresh statutory guidance. The group met four times over the course of 2019, and developed draft amended guidance. Due to COVID-19, the Group decided to pause this work given the limited capacity of education authorities and schools to prepare for and implement refreshed statutory guidance at this time. Officials are considering how best to strengthen parental engagement following the OECD PISA 2022 results and the respective Muir and National Discussion reports, which highlighted a growing appetite for more “meaningful engagement” opportunities for parents.

Data on the full time equivalent home-school link workers from 2017 onwards can be found in the School Support Staff Statistics, here: https://www.gov.scot/publications/school-support-staff-statistics/

Prior to 2017, this data can be found in the Teacher Census Supplementary Statistics tables 'Teacher Census 2016' and earlier editions, here: https://www.gov.scot/publications/teacher-census-supplementary-statistics/

School support staff statistics from the 2023 school staff and pupils census are due to be published on 19 February 2024.

There are currently 25 members of the Co-Production Group. Six are serving teachers, and two additional secondary teachers have been invited to join the group, which will bring the total to eight. The following stakeholders are represented:

• Teachers and practitioners
• Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (COSLA)
• Education Scotland
• Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA)
• Scottish Council of Deans of Education (SCDE)
• General Teaching Council for Scotland (GTCS)
• Association of Directors of Education (ADES)
• Education Institute of Scotland (EIS)
• NASUWT
• School Leaders Scotland (SLS)
• AHDS
• Scottish Council of Independent Schools (SCiS)
• Scottish Secondary Teachers’ Association (SSTA)
• CLD Standards Council
• Early Years Scotland
• Scottish Social Services Council
• National Centre for Gaelic Language and Culture

The Co-Production Group is one part of the overall co-production process. Ongoing additional engagement with teachers and stakeholders will take place as part of the design process.

The Scottish Government has carefully considered Professor Ken Muir’s report Putting Learners at the Centre: Towards a Future Vision for Scottish Education which produced important recommendations for Scottish education. In response to a wide range of reports and evidence, the Education Reform Programme will deliver significant changes for the education system, including a new national agency and a Centre for Teaching Excellence.

Providing equitable support to the profession, including in relation to curriculum and assessment, is a fundamental consideration of all aspects of the Education Reform Programme. Education Scotland continues to deliver its functions while the new organisations are being developed, and continually reviews its support offering to ensure it is effective and fit for purpose.

The co-production process through which stakeholders are designing the Centre for Teaching Excellence will conclude in the first half of 2024, followed by a process to identify a suitable host institution(s). We expect the Centre for Teaching Excellence to launch shortly thereafter.

Table 1 provides information on average gross revenue expenditure in Scotland per child attending pre-school, and primary and secondary pupil alongside allocations (accounting for teaching and tuition fees funding) per college and university place.

Further to question S6W-21835, I can confirm that no further working groups have been established since October 2023 within the Education and Skills portfolio.

I can confirm that all of the working groups listed in that answer are still active. However please note, one additional group was missed in the original PQ response. Therefore the current active working groups are as follows: