Highlands schools ranked in Sunday Times primary school league table for 2025
Schools in Inverness, Thurso and Easter Ross topped a list of 47 Highland schools in The Sunday Times’ Scottish primary school league table, released today.
Sutherland’s only ranked school, Dornoch Primary, ranked 46th in the Highlands (1,105th overall in Scotland).
Ranked 60th overall in the Scotland-wide list, Lochardil Primary in Inverness was the highest placed Highland school, achieving a maximum score of 400 in reading, writing, numeracy, plus combined listening and talking.
St Catherine's Primary School, Renfrewshire regained its title as the highest ranked in school in Scotland, while Our Lady of Lourdes Primary School, West Lothian was ranked second – despite nearly a third of pupils being deemed “very deprived” in the Scottish Government’s index of multiple deprivation.
Miller Academy Primary School in Thurso, with a score of 390, was the second highest ranked Highland primary, with Bridgend Primary in Alness coming third.
In close quarters was Craighill Primary, who ranked fourth (172nd overall in Scotland).
Mount Pleasant Primary in Thurso was ranked the lowest in Highland, in 47th place, ranked 1181st overall in Scotland.
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
