Changes have been announced to this year’s exams timetable for secondary school pupils after concerns were raised over workloads.
The Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA) has today said the 2025 exam timetable for National 5, Higher, and Advanced Higher qualifications will be altered, after listening to feedback from learners, schools and parents or carers.
The 2025 exams will now start one day earlier on Friday 25 April, and end as planned on Monday 2 June.
In 2024, SQA consulted extensively with external stakeholders, including Schools Leaders Scotland (SLS) and the Association of Directors of Education in Scotland (ADES), before the publication of the 2025 National Qualifications timetable.
SQA was asked to consider a later start date to ensure learners had a full week back at school after the Easter holidays.
The exams bosses said they took this feedback on board and delayed the start of the timetable, having been advised that any scheduling issues could be resolved at a local level within schools.
However, since publishing the timetable last year, a growing number of concerns have been raised about the increase in coincident and consecutive exams - where two or more exams have been scheduled at the same time, or a learner is due to sit two exams directly after one another – and an increase in pressure on learners.
Adding an extra day also eases potential logistical challenges for schools and colleges, including assessment arrangements for learners who require additional support.
Jean Blair, Director of Operations at SQA, said: “SQA works with external stakeholders when drafting the examination timetable. Our top priority is developing a timetable that allows learners to produce their best work on the day of their exams.
“As the Easter holidays are later this year, we responded to feedback from partners and produced a compressed timetable to allow learners more time to prepare for their exams. This led to a rise in coincident and consecutive exams.
"We have listened to and share the concerns raised by schools, colleges, learners and parents/carers about this. The new timetable will ease pressure for many learners giving them a better chance to perform to the best of their abilities on the day of their exam.”
While the new timetable does decrease the number of learners impacted by scheduling issues overall, the changes may mean that some learners will have consecutive exams that they did not have previously. SQA has discussed feedback and the revised timetable with SLS and ADES, and all parties agree that these changes will be an overall benefit to learners and schools.
Graham Hutton, General Secretary of School Leaders Scotland said, “We continue to share feedback and work with SQA and other partners in the best interests of both learners and our members.
"The delayed start to the exam period was designed to allow learners to be more exam-ready after the later Easter holidays.
"As a consequence, this led to an increased number of learners having exams close together or coincident. We therefore agree with the changes made by SQA to reduce the impact of coincident and consecutive exams on learners.”
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