Questions were raised last night about what the £3million funding boost would do to tackle the country’s recent “embarrassing” school stats.
Although Education Secretary John Swinney’s announcement was broadly welcomed, opposition politicians warned it felt short of what was needed to tackle the “crisis” revealed in the Programme for International Student Assessment (Pisa) figures in December.
Scotland’s scores for maths, reading and science all declined to lower levels than any previous survey of that type.
The country’s ranking for science dropping from “above average” to “average”, while maths and reading both remained “average”.
When Scotland first took part in the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) survey of 15-year-olds, its performance in reading, science and maths were all above average.
Mr Thomson, who also serves as a councillor in Aberdeen, said that while he welcomed the fund, more action was needed.
He said: “We feel like there is a crisis in the north of Scotland and that teacher recruitment should be treated as a national priority.
“We can see from the Pisa results that we are falling behind Europe and our other neighbouring countries in the UK.
“The SNP have always said that education is a priority for them, but we have debated Brexit for a total of 37 hours in the Scottish parliament and spent eight hours on education since June.
“I think that shows their priorities.”
He added that there was broad consensus among the parties for the Curriculum for Excellence policy but that it had to be “better managed” by government agencies.
He said: “The principles behind curriculum for excellence are well supported.
“The widening attainment gap is becoming a deeper problem, agencies are absolutely failing pupils.
“We should have more independence in the system and an independent assessor.”
Mr Swinney said: “To give all our young people the best opportunity of success, we need to have the right number of skilled teachers in our schools.
“That is why we worked with local authorities to increase teacher numbers this year, with an additional 253 teachers in Scottish classrooms, and are upping student places for the sixth consecutive year.”
