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Publication - Statistics

School estate statistics 2020

Published
8 September 2020
From
Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills
Directorate
Learning Directorate
Part of
Education
ISBN
9781800040533

Results of the 2020 School Estate Core Facts Survey.

This document is part of a collection

View supporting documents Supporting documents

Chapter 4: School suitability

86.5% of schools of a good or satisfactory suitability in April 2020.

88.3% of pupils in schools of a good or satisfactory suitability in April 2020.

Suitability provides a measure of the extent to which a school building and its grounds provide an environment which supports quality learning and teaching. The following ratings are used to measure school suitability:

  • A: Good – Performing well and operating effectively;
  • B: Satisfactory – Performing well but with minor problems;
  • C: Poor – Showing major problems and/or not operating optimally;
  • D: Bad – Does not support the delivery of services to children and communities.

The proportion of schools with a good or satisfactory suitability has increased 5.4 percentage points from 81.1 per cent in April 2014 to 86.5 per cent in April 2020 (Table 4.1).

Taking into account the different number of pupils in each school, there has been a 5.3 percentage point increase in the proportion of pupils in good or satisfactory suitability schools from 83.0 per cent in April 2014 to 88.3 per cent in April 2020 (Table 4.2).

Information on the suitability of schools in Dundee City in 2020 was not available at the time of this publication. Therefore, ratings from the 2019 School Estates Core Facts Survey have been used for schools in in Dundee City to produce comparable statistics for Scotland as a whole. See section 6.2 of the background notes for more information.

Table 4.1: Suitability of schools, 2014-2020 (1)
2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020(2)(3)
Count A: Good 688 706 728 777 788 816 862
B: Satisfactory 1,387 1,339 1,324 1,271 1,295 1,327 1,292
C: Poor 451 463 445 447 405 336 328
D: Bad 28 26 22 16 8 9 6
Suitability not recorded 4 4 5 5 5 4 1
A: Good or B: Satisfactory 2,075 2,045 2,052 2,048 2,083 2,143 2,154
C: Poor or D: Bad 479 489 467 463 413 345 334
Percentage A: Good 26.9 27.8 28.8 30.9 31.5 32.7 34.6
B: Satisfactory 54.2 52.8 52.5 50.5 51.8 53.3 51.9
C: Poor 17.6 18.2 17.6 17.8 16.2 13.5 13.2
D: Bad 1.1 1.0 0.9 0.6 0.3 0.4 0.2
Suitability not recorded 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.0
A: Good or B: Satisfactory 81.1 80.6 81.3 81.4 83.3 86.0 86.5
C: Poor or D: Bad 18.7 19.3 18.5 18.4 16.5 13.8 13.4

1. Suitability as reported in April of relevant year.

2. No suitability was recorded for one school as it is a special school located in a hospital.

3. Suitability ratings from April 2019 have been used for schools in Dundee City as their 2020 ratings were not available at the time of publication.

Table 4.2: School pupils by suitability of school, 2014-2020 (1, 2)
2014 2015 2016 2017 2018(3) 2019(3) 2020(4)(5)
Count A: Good 234,021 240,245 250,508 271,260 279,971 281,391 289,046
B: Satisfactory 323,994 316,170 312,851 302,296 311,869 324,392 326,281
C: Poor 102,527 107,368 104,009 101,321 92,890 83,050 77,597
D: Bad 11,581 10,393 8,095 5,795 2,292 2,300 3,668
Suitability not recorded 320 1,353 2,086 2,150 2,180 643 0
A: Good or B: Satisfactory 558,015 556,415 563,359 573,556 591,840 605,783 615,327
C: Poor or D: Bad 114,108 117,761 112,104 107,116 95,182 85,350 81,265
Percentage A: Good 34.8 35.6 37.0 39.7 40.6 40.7 41.5
B: Satisfactory 48.2 46.8 46.2 44.3 45.3 46.9 46.8
C: Poor 15.2 15.9 15.4 14.8 13.5 12.0 11.1
D: Bad 1.7 1.5 1.2 0.8 0.3 0.3 0.5
Suitability not recorded 0.0 0.2 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.1 0.0
A: Good or B: Satisfactory 83.0 82.4 83.1 84.0 85.9 87.6 88.3
C: Poor or D: Bad 17.0 17.4 16.5 15.7 13.8 12.3 11.7

1. Suitability as reported in April of relevant year.

2. Refers to pupils on the school roll the previous September except where rolls have been updated to reflect the number of pupils on 1st April. Schools opened after September but before April will have no pupils recorded unless the school roll was supplied during this collection. Please see section 6.1 of the background notes for more information.

3. Pupil rolls for 2018 and 2019 were corrected in September 2020 as special school pupils were missing from these figures.

4. No suitability was recorded for one school as it is a special school located in a hospital. Zero pupils were on its roll.

5. Suitability ratings from April 2019 have been used for schools in Dundee City as their 2020 ratings were not available at the time of publication. Pupil rolls have been updated to September 2019.

Contact

Email: school.stats@gov.scot

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