A MAJOR report on the future of science education in Scotland has been given a "fail" by experts.
Professor Ian Wall, founder of the Edinburgh International Science Festival, made the comment at the Scottish Parliament's education committee, which is looking at the quality of Stem education.
Mr Wall told MSPs a Scottish Government report on promoting and developing Stem education was "flim flam" and that it would fail if it was a school essay because it was full of "visuals" and "meaningless".
The former chairman of the Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics Education Committee said: "Often what is done by all politicians and the civil servants who respond to them is really short term.
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"One minor change in a figure either a triumph beyond parallel or disaster in which Scottish education is going to the dogs.
"All politicians, all parties play this game and it is a game because it's meaningless and counterproductive to what we're trying to do.
"If you look at the current administration's report on its Stem strategy for this year it is a really poor piece of work.
"If it was submitted as an essay to a teacher or a report on a project it would get a C minus or a D plus or a fail actually. It's a piece of flim flam.
"It should be a quarter of its length if you take out the visuals and meaningless stuff."
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However, Professor Iain Hunter, Professor of Molecular Microbiology at Strathclyde University, said it was important to report annually on progress.
The Scottish Government published its Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics: Education and Training Strategy for Scotland in October 2017, with a five year span to drive improvements in STEM education.
The annual report published in February said progress had been made in the first year, but further improvements in quality of teaching were expected in the second year.
Minister for Science Richard Lochhead said: “There is no quick fix to improving gender balance and other issues in Stem.
"Our strategy aims to tackle the issues from several angles based on research from Professor Ian Wall among others, and our first annual report showed good progress setting up the initial infrastructure to take forward focussed activity and bring changes after just one year of what is a five-year strategy.
“Closing equity gaps in Stem subjects is one of the four key aims of the strategy and we have provided new guidance to teachers to help tackle gender stereotyping."
The Scottish Government's Stem bursary scheme funded 107 career changers to become teachers in high-demand Stem subjects in 2018/19. An extra 3" millon has been allocated to fund a further 100 bursaries in 2019/20.
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