Target setting

The Scottish Office Education and Industry Department (SOEID) states that the provision of a high-quality education can have lasting effects on children's capacities to succeed in life. Raising attainment through target setting is viewed as a means for continually improving education, as outlined in the document 'Raising Standards - Target Setting'.

Raising standards of attainment is at the heart Scottish education. All young people in our schools have the right to receive an education of a high quality which is appropriate to their needs and aptitudes. They need to develop skills which will help them to contribute to an increasingly complex and changing society.

SOEID, Setting Targets - Raising Standards in Schools, Edinburgh: HMSO, 1998

Target setting was introduced in Scotland in 1998. To support schools in raising attainment, funding was made available for a variety of initiatives, Early Intervention (EI) being one of them. A range of documentation has continued to be produced by SOEID/SEED/SE to provide guidance for schools and local authorities in their quest for attaining set targets.

Accountability is now more public. Schools have to share set targets and report on progress towards their achievement. Parents can choose the school that their children will attend, having had the opportunity to obtain relevant information about the performance of schools in the area.

Many have welcomed such transparency and the right to choose. There are, however, concerns that the underpinning values of comprehensive education are being undermined. Stephen Ball (1994:146) summarises the differences between comprehensive and market value bases. Although Ball refers to the English system, there is perhaps some resonance to consider within the current Scottish context.

Comparison of Values
Comprehensive values	Market values
Individual need (schools and students). Commonality (mixed ability classes/open access). An emphasis on resource allocation to the less able. Collectivism (cooperation between schools and students). Broad assessments of worth are based upon varieties of qualities. The education of all children is held to be of intrinsic worth.	Individual performance (schools and students). Differentiation/hierarchy (setting/streaming/selection/exclusion). An emphasis on resource allocation to the more able. Competition (between schools and students). Narrow assessments of worth are based on contributions of 'performativity'. The education of children is valued in relation to costs and outcomes.

Ball, S, Education Reform: A critical and post-structuralist approach, Buckingham: Open University Press, 1994.

The national and local monitoring and tracking of attainment results has:

encouraged each school and each local authority to create and maintain an explicit focus on raising attainment
instigated considerable professional dialogue and reflection about expectations, responsibilities, accountability and practice in schools in relation to: curriculum, attainment, learning and teaching, support for learning, ethos and management.

Since the introduction of the target-setting initiative, there has been a reported increase in the number of children sitting and passing national tests in English language and mathematics at or before the stage at which almost all children should attain. It is, however, important to note that national test results were not necessarily systematically monitored, tracked or recorded in schools and local authorities prior to this initiative.

Few would argue against a focus on the raising of children's attainment, but it is how this is best achieved to enable children to become independent learners that remains the critically important challenge. We now know so much about effective teaching and learning and how essential it is to help children to develop as active thinkers. The development of a range of thinking skills, creative and expressive skills, personal and social skills, literacy and numeracy are all fundamentally important not only to individuals themselves but also to the society to which they contribute.

The balance, breadth and nature of the curriculum, with its related teaching, learning and assessment procedures, are fundamental to the quality of education achieved.

Teachers and parents have expressed concern that the pressure on schools to achieve targets set may affect the nature, quality, breadth and depth of education that can be provided. There are strong concerns that the pressure of target setting forces a curriculum driven by assessment that, in turn, can determine the way teachers teach and the way that children are expected to learn. There are fears that because of time and resources available, the skills, knowledge and understanding being developed may have to be limited to those that children need to pass national tests. The Sixth Report (2003) on the Inquiry into the Purposes of Scottish Education argues for a system that actively develops children's powers of reasoning, critical thinking, problem solving, creative thinking skills, and personal, social and citizenship skills that are each fundamental to all aspects of social participation and effective learning.

Currently, national test results provide the measure of how well children in a school are attaining.

There may be changes to assessment procedures, because of response to the Scottish Parliament's recent and widespread consultation The National Debate on Education.

New assessment procedures that are being debated and trialled, and then reported on the Assessment is for Learning website, may affect some aspects of the target-setting process.