'Close the Gap' attainment campaign

Deaf children are not always achieving the same level of qualifications as their hearing peers in Scottish schools. This is a scandal. NDCS Scotland is campaigning to close the gap.

Deafness is not a learning disability and there is no reason why, with the right level of support, the majority of deaf children should not do as well in school as their hearing peers.

The Scottish Government does not routinely publish information on the attainment of deaf pupils in Scotland, as the cohort numbers have been traditionally deemed too small to make public.

NDCS does not believe that this is good enough. We want the Government to routinely publish information on how deaf children are performing at school so that we can monitor where services are working well for deaf pupils and where additional resources are needed.

Following our successful lobbying, the Scottish Government has entered into dialogue with NDCS to tackle this issue and Ministers have confirmed to us that deaf children in Scotland are sometimes not getting the same level of qualifications as their hearing classmates.

In the absence of centrally collected data, we are citing the results of the Scottish Executive-funded Achievements of Deaf Pupils in Scotland (ADPS) project, run by the Scottish Sensory Centre at the University of Edinburgh between 2000 and 2005.   

This supports evidence from England, where the UK Government has published figures which show that deaf children are 42% less likely to get 5 GCSEs at grades A to C than their hearing peers.

NDCS Scotland is continuing our positive dialogue with the Scottish Government on this issue, and we are pushing for the publication of more detailed data on the performance of deaf children in Scottish schools, particularly in the key subjects of English and maths.

We also want to make sure that deaf children leave school as confident individuals and effective contributors to society. We believe that a supportive and inclusive school environment is key to this.

NDCS has successfully worked with Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Education to produce best practice guidance for teachers working with deaf children in Scotland. We now need better access to information on deaf pupil numbers and performance to help us monitor the impact that this is having and identify areas in Scotland where deaf children are performing particularly well.

NDCS UK takes the Close the Gap campaign to Scottish MPs at Westminster

In June 2008, NDCS launched the Must do better! (1842 kb) campaign report on barriers to achievement by deaf children outside the Houses of Parliament in London.

• January 2009: NDCS Scotland briefs MSPs ahead of a Scottish Government debate on the future of the Scottish Qualifications Framework, highlighting that deaf pupils are too often not attaining at the same level as their hearing peers.  As a result of our briefing, the Shadow Cabinet Secretary for Education and Lifelong learning calls on the Scottish Government to ensure that all new courses and qualifications are accessible to deaf pupils. 
  NDCS Scotland MSP Briefing: Next Generation of National Qualifications (January 2009) (32 kb)
• November 2008: As a result of our continued lobbying, more questions are asked in the Scottish Parliament on the attainment of deaf pupils.  The Government publicly acknowledges that there is an attainment gap in Scotland, citing the ADPS data.
• October 2008: NDCS Scotland responds to the Scottish Government consultation on the future of the Scottish Qualifications Framework. We make the point that any new curriculum and associated qualifications framework in Scotland must be fully accessible for deaf children before it is introduced. RNID Scotland endorse our views.
• September 2008: NDCS Scotland launches the Pick a number campaign, calling for better data collection on deaf pupils to help us monitor their progress. NDCS research estimates that there are twice as many deaf pupils in Scotland's schools than currently recorded.
• August 2008: American researchers to examine the attainment of deaf pupils in mathematics, in a study involving children from Aberdeen School for the Deaf.
• June 2008: NDCS Scotland briefs Dr Richard Simpson MSP on the lack of information on the attainment of deaf children in Scotland. Dr Simpson raises the issue at Scottish Government Question Time in the Scottish Parliament.
  
  Scotland's Commissioner for Children and Young People launches a report to the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, which, in paragraph 80, highlights the lack of published data on the attainment of disabled children.
• February 2008: NDCS Scotland meets with Minister for Children and Early Years to discuss attainment.
• December 2007: NDCS Scotland works with Cathie Craigie MSP to lodge a number of written questions in the Scottish Parliament on the attainment of deaf pupils.
• November 2007: NDCS and HMIE publish guidance on how mainstream schools can create supportive environments for deaf pupils.
• October 2007: Cross Party MSPs push the Scottish Government Minister for Communities on attainment of deaf pupils during Scottish Parliament debate on NDCS Change Your World Consultation.

In late 2007/early 2008, we asked parents to give us their views on their deaf child's education.

Over 350 parents responded to our survey. We would like to thank everyone who took the time to feed in their views. Read our summary of the results to find out what parents thought.

• NDCS survey on educational attainment: Results (98 kb)

In 2000, the then Scottish Executive commissioned the Scottish Sensory Centre at the University of Edinburgh to undertake research on the achievements of deaf pupils in Scotland. 

The ADPS project gathered data on the number of Scottish deaf pupils and tracked their attainment between 2000 and 2004.

NDCS Scotland needs you. 

• Is your deaf child performing exceptionally well at school?  Tell us about it – what makes the support they receive at school so effective? 
  
• Or, are you frustrated at low expectations of your child’s abilities? 
  Tell us – we need to know the scale of the problem. 

Our message to the Scottish Government is: Keep the best, improve the rest! 

We need you to tell us about the best, and the worst, provision for deaf children in Scotland’s schools.

One parent said:

"I feel that the education system is lacking for deaf children. Teachers are often unsure of how to ‘teach’ a deaf child, often leaving them to their own resources."

Case studies like these help NDCS to demonstrate to the Scottish government the case for action to close the attainment gap.

Email your stories to: campaigns.scotland@ndcs.org.uk.

To support our campaign, NDCS has been asking children across the UK to draw images of what they want to be when they grow up. 

We received lots of entries, including some really impressive drawings from Scotland.

View the gallery >

These images will be used to show the government that deaf children have the same range of aspirations and ambitions as all other children and we would like to thank all those who sent in their images or told us what they want to be when they grow up.

If you have any questions about this campaign in Scotland, or if you would like to tell us about your experiences, please get in touch. 

Email: campaigns.scotland@ndcs.org.uk.

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