Technologies in Scotland’s Curriculum for Excellence 2011-2025

From “Time for Change?” to “Time for Action”

Abstract

Scotland stands at a pivotal moment for technological education. After a decade of stagnation, the recently launched Curriculum Improvement Cycle (CIC) and Education (Scotland) Act 2025 mark the most significant structural reforms since Curriculum for Excellence. For the Technologies, in particular Craft, Design, Engineering and Graphics (CDEG), this moment offers the chance to redefine subject identity, rebuild professional confidence, and reconnect Scotland to international design and technology education research.
Since McLaren’s Technologies in Scotland’s Curriculum for Excellence: Time for Change? (2011), there has been little sustained research, professional association activity, or policy attention focused on CDEG. The field remains constrained by outdated perceptions, declining ITE recruitment, and the absence of a coherent subject voice. These disciplinary weaknesses have combined with systemic inertia to erode CDEG’s vitality and place within secondary education.
This paper argues that the convergence of curriculum reform, qualification redesign, and new institutional structures constitutes a unique opportunity to arrest, and reverse, this decline. It positions the author’s role as National Advisor, a post created to lead the CIC’s reform of the 3–18 Technologies curriculum, as part of a wider renewal of vision and research culture in Scottish technological education. Reviewing Scottish policy and literature since 2011, the paper synthesises evidence from national reviews, legislative developments, and sector analyses to recontextualise McLaren’s earlier optimism and diagnose the sources of inertia.
The analysis identifies three interrelated insights: CDEG’s decline stems from structural neglect rather than curricular irrelevance; current reforms represent an unprecedented opportunity for revival; and sustained progress will depend on rebuilding subject identity, research capacity, and workforce stability.
This paper invites the PATT community to engage with Scotland’s renewal of technological education, both as a case study in systemic transformation and as a call for collaborative scholarship to ensure that CDEG’s “time for change” is finally realised.