- Learner participants in Live Lessons
- 75,000 plus
- Teacher attendees at professional learning
- Two thousand eight hundred and thirtyâone
- Resource downloads
- Twenty thousand plus
What people say
Impact
-
We feature in the Scottish Government’s Guidelines and Guardrails for the use of AI in Schools
The Scottish Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills has published advice and guidance for schools and other education settings on the safe and ethical use of AI in education. The Government’s Guidelines and Guardrails for the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Schools align with Scotlandâs AI Strategy 2026-2031 and…
-
Kate Farrell at The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine
Our Director of Curriculum Development Kate Farrell was invited to speak at  The National Academies workshop “International Practices in K-12 Mathematics Education: The Role of Computational Thinking, Data Science, and AI“, which took place in Washington, DC on the 23-24 February 2026. A global gathering of experts in the field,…
-
North Lanarkshire Digital Team adapt Escape Room resources for local schools
Five members of the North Lanarkshire Digital Learning Team have attended the Data Education Professional Learning course over the past two years. The Digital Learning Team work across over 155 primary, secondary and special schools in the region, supporting 3,700 teachers to integrate effective digital literacies and pedagogies into their…
-
Micro:bits partnership with East Lothian
In the context of the Micro:bits on the Move programme, helping Informatics students at the University of Edinburgh deliver Micro:bit workshops for learners across across Scotland, we partnered with the Digital Learning team in East Lothian to further support teachers to use the hardware in the classroom. Our colleagues Kate…
-
AI in Scottish Schools: A Showcase of Resources for Primary and Secondary Teachers
On Friday 19th September 2025, we held an event in collaboration with Childrenâs Parliament  and the Scottish AI Alliance. “AI in Scottish Schools” addressed teachers, educators, researchers, and policymakers and highlighted work introducing AI literacy for educators and learners and having childrenâs voices and rights at its heart. Our team at Data…
-
Building knowledge and confidence: Heriot Watt STEM Ambassadors programme and their use of Escape Room resources
The Heriot Watt outreach team have been using resources from the Data Education in Schools programme as part of their STEM Ambassadors programme for undergraduates with really positive results. Heriot Watt students can sign up to be STEM Ambassadors and are supported by the outreach team to develop the skills, confidence and knowledge to teach STEM…
-
Stimulating change in practice with a Data Literacy Day in one West Lothian School
Data Education in Schools offers a Data Literacy course to teachers with the immediate effect of providing new understanding, approaches and resources to those individual teacher participants. This resulted in additional impacts, as the course was able to inspire teachers to make changes within their schools â with the Data Education in Schoolâs support in doing…
-
The âripple effectâ of change in one East Lothian primary school
Chris is a deputy head teacher at a primary school in East Lothian. He attended the Data Literacy professional learning course and has both directly adapted material and approaches from the course. He has also shared with other colleagues who in turn use and modify them, leading to âripple effectsâ of adaptation and evolution within the…
-
Unbelievably Creative AI show on STV News
We were happy to welcome STV News to one of the sessions of our February run of the Unbelievably Creative show at the Edinburgh Futures Institute. The session featured in a news story on how Scottish school pupils are learning about the potential and risks of AI. Designed and delivered by…
-
Goodison Group Scotlandâs Futures Forum at the Scottish Parliament
On the 19th February, our Programme Director Judy Robertson and Jen Ross, Professor of Digital Culture and Education Futures at the University of Edinburgh Centre for Research in Digital Education, were invited to speak at the Goodison Group Scotlandâs Futures Forum at the Scottish Parliament. Judy and Jen presented research…
-
Unbelievably Creative at the Edinburgh Futures Institute
We have been happy to work with our partners at Digital Skills Education to bring the free, interactive Unbelievably Creative AI Show to the Edinburgh Futures Institute. In February 2025, we hosted six classes from Edinburgh secondary schools for a total of 140 learners. The participants were S1 to S4…
-
NC Data Science Education Summit
Kate Farrell (Director of Curriculum Development and Professional Learning) and Tommy Lawson (Schools Technology Advisor) attended the NC Data Science Education Summit (24-25 October 2024) as invited speakers, nominated by Data Science 4 Everyone (DS4E), a coalition created by the University of Chicago Center for RISC. The Summit unites practitioners from higher…
Awards and Recognition
-
Judy Robertson wins the 2026 Suffrage Science Award in Computing
At a ceremony hosted in the Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgkin Building on the 26th January 2026, Professor Judy Robertson received a Suffrage Science Award in Computing. She was nominated by Dr Sue Sentence for her interdisciplinary approach to supporting young people’s understanding of AI and computing, and her leadership in supporting…
-
Judy Robertson receives the 2025 Chancellorâs Award for Teaching
Professor Judy Robertson, Chair in Digital Learning and academic director of Data Education in Schools, has been awarded the prestigious Chancellorâs Award for Teaching in recognition of the significant impact of her work on enhancing childrenâs education in computer science, data literacy and AI, and in engaging teachers in professional learning….
-
CDCS Digital Research Prize 2025
We are honoured to have been Highly Commended at the University of Edinburgh’s Centre for Data, Culture & Society (CDCS) Digital Research Prizes ceremony in the category “Best Impact from a Data-Led project”. We have been awarded for our data-themed Escape Rooms, which have been influencing discussions on game-based learning…
-
Eric Liddell 100 Award 2024
We are thrilled to have been awarded the Eric Liddell 100 Award! Led by The Eric Liddell Community and partners, the Eric Liddell 100 Award is a celebration of Scotlandâs athletics and sports, as well as community service. Our team members Judy Robertson (Project Lead) and Jo Spiller (Director of Operations…
-
British Data Awards Ceremony 2024
The Data Education in Schools team are thrilled to have won the âEducation Initiative of the Yearâ Award at the British Data Awards last night. Jo Spiller (Programme Director) and Jasmeen Kanwal (Project Officer) attended the awards ceremony in the Great Hall of the Grand Connaught Rooms in Covent Garden,…
-
LILAC Information Literacy Award
The Data Education in Schools team are thrilled to have jointly won the 2024 Information Literacy Award, announced as part of the LILAC conference held in Leeds on the 25th March. The Award is organised by the CILIP Information Literacy Group (Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals) and the…
-
Schools win data visualisation award!
On Friday 3rd November Kate Farrell, Director of Curriculum Development and Professional Learning, collected the ‘Data Visualisation’ award at the 2023 Data Summit held at the Edinburgh International Conference Centre. The Data Lab competition asked entrants to create a data visualisation on the topic of âCommunityâ. The judges assessed the…
-
Winner! British Data Awards
Kate Farrell from the Data Education in Schools team collected the award for ‘Data For Good Initiative of the Year’ at the British Data Awards held last night in London. The award acknowledges the work involved in creating British Sign Language signs for Cyber Security, Computing Science and Data Science…
-
Winner! Digital Technology Awards
Tommy Lawson, Schools Technology Advisor for Data Education in Schools, won the ‘Unsung Hero’ award at the ScotlandIS Digital Technology Awards held in Glasgow last night. The ceremony recognised individuals and organisations through 11 awards, including Public Sector Innovation (won by iOpt), Climate Champion (Clearview Intelligence), Open Source Contribution…
-
Scotland Women in Technology Awards 2019
The Data Education in Schools team would like to congratulate their very own Kate Farrell (Director of Curriculum Development and Professional Learning) for winning the “Technology Champion in Education” award at the Scotland Women in Technology Awards 2019. Scottish Women in Technology (SWiT) recognises the passion, skills and dedication of…