The attainment gap among North Ayrshire primary school children in literacy and numeracy has narrowly reduced - but it still remains below the national average.

And North Ayrshire Council depute leader and education cabinet member Shaun Macaulay admits there is still much room for improvement in the classroom.

The poverty-related attainment gap data for literacy has improved by four percentage points between 2021-22 and 2022-23 and for numeracy by two percentage points.

In primary literacy, in 2022-23, some 68.45 per cent of children achieved  the appropriate attainment, an improvement by 1.16 percentage points.

In 2022-23, 75.8 per cent of children in North Ayrshire achieved the appropriate attainment level in primary numeracy.

North Ayrshire Council's performance has improved by 0.33 percentage points between 2021-22 and 2022-23.

Nationally, 79.6 per cent of children achieved the appropriate attainment level in numeracy.

Some 94.5 per cent of NAC school leavers achieved Level 4 literacy –  the lowest since 2019.

For Level 5 the total of  81.5 per cent is above the virtual comparator (VC) by nearly two percentage points.

Some 94 per cent of S4 leavers achieved Level 3 literacy – the highest percentage in five years.

North Ayrshire has improved by five percentage points since 2021-22 and is 6.8 percentage points above the virtual comparator.

In all, 94.9 per cent of S4 leavers achieved Level 3 numeracy – the highest in the last five years. 

Some 79.2 percent of S4 leavers achieved Level 4 numeracy, also the highest percentage in five years.

In all, 52.3 per cent of S5 leavers achieved Level 5 numeracy.

For all leavers In North Ayrshire Council in 2022-23, the percentage of all school leavers heading to  a positive destination is 96.5 – the highest in five years.

Council leader Marie Burns told the council's cabinet:  “There’s some really good news in there but some areas obviously for improvement.”

Cllr Macaulay added:  “This is a very comprehensive report, there are real good news stories in that as there have been the last few years.

"Some  of the data highlights the excellent work that goes on in the schools and more outcomes for young people so well done to the staff.

“We must now do things to make sure we improve.”