Easter Ross primaries named in Highland top five in Sunday Times primary school league table for 2025
Primary schools in Easter Ross have made the top five across the Highlands in the The Sunday Times’ Scottish primary school league table, released today.
Bridgend Primary in Alness and Craighill Primary, Tain ranked third and fourth, respectively, just behind schools in Inverness and Thurso.
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Bridgend, with a score of 380/400 took third place and 167th in the whole of Scotland, were very closely followed by Craighill, also on 380, who were ranked 172nd overall.
Bridgend was higher ranked with 60 per cent of 278 pupils deprived or very deprived in the Scottish Government’s index of multiple deprivation, compared to the Tain school’s 50 per cent of 213 pupils.
Elsewhere across Ross, Beauly Primary was ranked 11th in Highland with a score of 370, while Tarradale Primary in Muir of Ord scored 360 to place 14th.
Dingwall Primary with a score of 350 was ranked 18th across Highland.
At the other end of the table, Obsdale Primary, Alness was the lowest ranked Ross school, with a score of 220, ranked 46th in the Highlands, and 1176th overall in Scotland.
Ranked 60th overall in the Scotland-wide list, Lochardil Primary in Inverness was the highest ranked Highland school, attaining a maximum score of 400 in reading, writing, numeracy, plus combined listening and talking.
Miller Academy Primary School in Thurso, with a score of 390, was the second highest ranked Highland primary across a list of 55 schools rated in the Highland region, coming 110th overall in the whole of Scotland.
Across the whole of Scotland, St Catherine's Primary School, Renfrewshire was ranked first, while Our Lady of Lourdes Primary School, West Lothian came second – despite nearly a third of pupils being deemed “very deprived” in the Scottish Government’s index of multiple deprivation.
The Primary School League Table ranks success at P7 in around 1,200 schools, using the Scottish government’s Achievement in Curriculum for Excellence Levels (Acel) database.
Examining P7 scores is considered a useful measure of a school's performance at the conclusion of a pupil's academic journey at primary level.
There are over 2000 primary schools in Scotland but more than a third do not submit Acel data each year.
The Acel database ranks the percentage of pupils meeting the four key indicators of reading, writing, numeracy, plus combined listening and talking.
It also counts the percentage of pupils that hail from deprived neighbourhoods, using the government’s Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation.
A record 89 schools scored top marks this year, up from 85 last year and just 52 when the government first began compiling data in 2016/17.
The full searchable table of 1200 participating schools is available at: thetimes.com/uk/scotland/article/scottish-school-league-table-2025-best-primary-xfnxxlv22
