Advanced Higher Upskilling Pilot

We are so excited that our Advanced Higher Upskilling pilot went live this month!

With over 70+ teachers signed up, across 27 councils, from 55+ secondary schools across Scotland!

We appointed 5 incredible tutors all who have a wealth of experience and knowledge of Advanced Higher. The team consists of Morag, Debbie, Mark, Tony and Gordon.

Morag Shaw, who has also taught Computing Science for over 35 years and is the Principal Assessor for Advanced Higher

Mark Hay from Robert Gordon’s College who has taught Advanced Higher for over 10 years and has experience as an SQA marker and is team leader for Higher.

Tony Harkins, from St Aloysius, who has taught Advanced Higher for over 25 years and has experience as an SQA marker, checker and writer for Higher and Advanced Higher.

Debbie Kennedy, from St Kentigern’s Academy, who has taught Advanced Higher for 22 years and has an outstanding record of success with uptake and gender balance throughout all year groups right up to Advanced Higher.

Gordon Rae from Robert Gordon’s College, who has taught Advanced Higher for over 20 years and has experience as an SQA marker, team leader and now he is Depute Principal Assessor for Advanced Higher.

The aim is to develop strong understanding of the fundamentals of the Object Oriented Programming topic. We will focus on conceptual understanding, design notations, the notional machine of the SQA reference language as well as Python and Java among others. We will also address effective pedagogical methods using evidence from SQA reports and tutor-teachers with strong SQA experience. Teachers will spend 90 minutes per week over 8 weeks. With two sessions out of 4 completed so far the feedback we have received has been overwhelmingly positive.

The novel model is reaching teachers all across the country. It is a fantastic opportunity to bring computing science teachers together to learn from some of the most experienced teachers, who have a wealth of knowledge and great track records in their own schools. This is particularly important for computing science, as the majority of schools only have one or two-person departments.

We are here to help, if you’d like a chat you can email up at support@stacs.scot or DM us.