Please see below a statement from the Highland Council regarding the ongoing SQA procedures of estimates and awards.

Friday 29 May was the deadline for schools to send estimates to the Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA) as part of this year’s process for arriving at final grades, following the cancellation of this year’s exams.  SQA will now check and validate the information we have submitted. SQA will now moderate it, if necessary, to ensure consistency across schools and colleges and with results from previous years and will use the information from these estimates, in addition to prior learner attainment, where this is available. For example, if learners achieved National 5 or Higher courses, in a previous year.  SQA will also look at schools’ previous history of estimating and attainment in each subject and level. SQA may moderate these estimates, up or down, if that is required.  This process will produce the results for learners, which will be issued to candidates on 4 August.

Nicky Grant, Interim Head of Education, said, “We would like to thank all of our teaching staff who were involved in the crucial process of submitting estimates.  We very much appreciate their hard work and professionalism as they carried out a complex task that was operating for the first time ever.  Their overall professional judgement, based on the available evidence from all candidate activity across the year, is a key part of the process.  We are also very grateful to our Principal Teachers, Depute Head Teachers and Head Teachers for carrying out rigorous quality assurance of the estimates across all subjects and courses, to ensure that they accurately capture the attainment of our young people during this very unusual session. It is now over to SQA to apply their moderation procedures and we look forward to seeing our Highland-wide results in August.