/u/mg9500 has always made a special effort to get to know each and every one of his constituents. He never did particularly care whether or not that he was actually eligible to vote for him - that’s electioneering and politics at its worst. This meant that he always took a keen interest in the fate of his local schools - and did so during this campaigning period with a visit to Kilsyth.

No stranger to a classroom grilling he took part in good spirits, although ducking a question regarding illegal substances prior to their legalisation in 2014. It is always a delight to hear students’ political aspirations, remembering his own life now in ancient times. This enabled a special passion to flourish throughout his politics of heightening the prominence of education and improving the system for all of his nation’s children. Daddy Stalin often sprang to mind.

Indeed, he took a moment in his ministerial car before entering the school to marvel at the fact that he had successfully achieved something that generations of politicians had failed to. He had successfully desectarianised Scotland’s schools. Indeed, this had been managed without the Archbishop of St Andrews condemning him to eternal hellfire, an official visit to the Vatican May be someway off, though. Being one of the first acts of his ministry, this highlights his commitment to positive educational reform. A track record a deliverance - something highly regarded by those in the profession.

Indeed, connecting with practitioners is just as important as with local schoolchildren. That’s why these sorts of round table discussions held, always regrettably, behind closed doors, are perhaps the most crucial event for support and legitimacy of any politician. To have the sole, undisturbed attention of a group of 30 people is a rather special occasion, something nothing else really lives up to.

Questioning rather understandably led on the issue of the government’s Education Bill, which recently past stage one in parliament. This would be the most transformative for the education section since the act of 1944 and it’s obvious that employment issues spring to the mind of any teacher when such wide ranging reforms are proposed. This is of course relevant to staff at all levels of the system, from classroom to senior management and was the first thing out of the block.

The cabinet secretary noted that this sort of thing was outside of his portfolio and that as such he is not the person who is the expert in the workings of the civil servants putting together the proposals. Regardless, he noted that with the expected number of pupils naturally unchanged as a result of any government programme, the number of educators required in response is similarly unaltered. This means that no one would be out of a job, despite the transfers of staff that would inevitably take place. He noted that it was his preference that this would be undertaken on the basis of the preferences of the teachers but that he believed that school staffing was ultimately a matter for local authorities and that has such he had no direct influence over the decision.

Particular attention was noted to the proposals to effectively abolish the subject of Modern Studies by those teachers who are qualified in this specialism. This was a simple answer that they would be able to be continually qualified in one of the component parts of modern studies now broken up, with the final sanctioning as always down to the General Teaching Council. This clearly does provide a measure of uniformity to the system across the country, along with the pay scale. The positive moves in that regard were noted in the meeting likewise at this point.

By now attention was turning to the eventual placing of education in the new two tier system of local government. Many older teachers had experienced the Strathclyde Education Authority in this area and such were hesitant and its placing, particularly at the primary level, at the proposed provincial level of government. They valued local schools for local communities, quite understandably.

It was a regret to point out that this isn’t always possible at secondary level. Many students will cross municipal boundaries to attend high school, always in rural areas of course. This is unavoidable in any country and is merely a feature of relative rurality. It therefore become a question of placing management of the two schooling levels with the same, provincial, level of government or dividing them. It was decided that it would be easiest for the public to understand if accountability could be placed at a single level of government and relatively local control had to be sacrificed for this. In saying that, the standalone nature of the cities and disproportionate representation of rural municipalities at the provincial level was noted in an attempt to alleviate concerns.

As the meeting came to a close, all that was left to do was to pose for photographs, probably for the School website or a local newspaper. A couple of senior students then helped to unveil a plaque commemorating the visit, something that lives long in the history of any school.