STEM Education in Scottish Schools

That the Parliament demands urgent action from the Scottish Government to reverse the decline in the number of secondary school teachers in science, maths, engineering and technology (STEM) subjects, which occurred between the academic sessions 2007-08 and 2013-14, and which, many employers believe, is leading to insufficient numbers of pupils seeking tertiary education courses in these subjects; is concerned that, if the situation is allowed to continue, there will be a detrimental effect on the Scottish economy, which, in the future, will be increasingly dependent on science, engineering and technology skills; urges the Scottish Government to heed the calls from the Royal Society of Chemistry in Scotland that there should be specialist science teachers in every primary school and the calls from the Institute of Physics in Scotland that more should be done to encourage female science graduates, and calls on the Scottish Government to work with local government and the General Teaching Council for Scotland to remove the red tape that is preventing full flexibility in the recruitment of teachers.