East Renfrewshire schools: great teaching or educational apartheid?

A class apart but schools’ success has a dark side.

Its leafy suburbs are home to some of the best schools in Scotland but what is the secret behind East Renfrewshire’s exam league table success?

With families rushing to snap up expensive properties in the affluent spot just so they can enrol their children at nursery, The Sunday Post has unearthed a success story fuelled by a desire to be the best.

But behind the area’s scholastic supremacy is a dark side ridden with crippling exam stress, desperate parents who lie to get their children into the best schools and the forgotten dreams of less able pupils looked over in favour of high-achieving classmates.

“Parents go to extraordinary lengths to get their kids in the school system here,” says Mhairi Shaw, the council’s Education Director.

“It’s getting earlier and earlier. More are moving here for the nursery places. These parents want the best for their kids and have aspirations to achieve.”

One parent told us she had moved to the area before her daughte, who is now six months old, was even born to ensure a spot at one of the council’s nurseries.

“It’s best to start early. The younger they get into a good education system the better chance they have of success in the future,” the IT worker said.

It’s not hard to see the force dragging parents to this otherwise nondescript middle-class area near Glasgow.

Last week, as more than 146,000 Scottish teenagers were ripping open their exam results, pupils at East Renfrewshire Council’s schools were celebrating most.

A total of 171 pupils gained five Highers at A grade up from 141 in 2012/13. And nearly 40% passed five Highers or more.

While record numbers of pupils across Scotland landed top Higher Grades last week, the pass rate was marginally down across the country as a whole. Not so here.

It means East Renfrewshire Council’s secondary schools will once again dominate Scotland’s school league tables when the Scottish Government compiles them in December.

Last year three East Renfrewshire Council schools, St Ninian’s High, Williamwood High and Mearns Castle, were the top three state schools.

For parents in affluent suburbs such as Giffnock, Newton Mearns and Eaglesham it made for pleasing reading.

But with their runaway performance comes a downside a widening gap in Scotland’s best and worst performing state schools growing under the SNP Government.

Critics argue it’s becoming an education chasm. But bosses at East Renfrewshire Council are unapologetic.

Ms Shaw added: “Our elected members actually want us to make the gap wider. They want the best for people here, not across Scotland.

“There’s no magic bullet for success just leadership, hard work and sharing information. The schools have an excellent reputation so we get hundreds of applications from teachers to work here. We pick the best, which drives up standards, making schools even better.”

But it’s not just school standards that are being driven up the local housing market is now soaring too.

While most of Scotland stutters towards recovery, East Renfrewshire has just become the most expensive area to buy a property, with an average house price of £232,987.

While other housing hotspots such as Aberdeen and Edinburgh have different catalysts driving their growth, state schools are behind East Renfrewshire’s surge.

Mark Jamieson, partner at Corum Property, said: “The school system gives the local housing market an undoubted boost in the arm but there are other amenities that make it incredibly attractive too.

“It’s close to the city but also close to the country. It’s really just a great place to bring up your kids.”

The clamour is such estate agents have been leafleting homes in the area, pleading with people to consider selling up, while many homes have been selling in less than a week.

According to parenting expert Liat Hughes Joshi, parents are unintentionally creating an educational apartheid in state schools.

She said: “If you can afford to move to an area with the best schools, that’s great. But you leave behind an area and other parents suffer as a result.

“We now have a widening gap in state education that is meant to offer all pupils the same education.”

Critics have been quick to condemn league tables based on exam performance alone because of what they DON’T tell you about schools and their performance.

By focusing on exams, things such as the attitude to under-performing pupils is swept under the carpet.

One East Renfrewshire secondary school teacher who would only speak to The Post anonymously agreed, saying she thinks the regime at her school is “blinkered”.

She said: “It’s become a blinkered regime where riding high in the league tables takes precedence. What the figures don’t tell you about is the growing number of girls I see with eating disorders because they feel under pressure.

“They don’t tell you about what I perceive to be a lack of support for those that don’t thrive in an exam setting. And they don’t tell you about the strain it places on teaching and how exam success is often to the detriment of extra curricular pursuits.”

A spokesman for the Scottish Government said: “While our attainment record is improving, poverty remains a major factor.

“Only independence will provide the ability to join up policy and create greater opportunities for the education system, investing in the early years of childhood and integrating our approach to education with taxation and benefits.”

Top 10 state schools

St Ninian’s High East Ren

Williamwood High East Ren

Mearns Castle High East Ren

Jordanhill School Glasgow

Dunblane High School Stirling

Tarbert Academy Argyll and Bute

Banchory Academy Aberdeenshire

Cults Academy Aberdeen

Glasgow Gaelic School Glasgow

Linlithgow Academy West Lothian

Bottom 10