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On Friday 30th November the "League Tables" of performance by Scottish schools were published. These statistics recognised Harris Academy as one of the "Dozen High Achievers" amongst schools in Scotland. The table below illustrates the performance of the school.
Table taken from TES (Scotland) Friday 30 Nov, 2001
Harris Academy, in the west end of Dundee, serves a mixed area covering all types of housing. With a large school population of 1350, headteacher James Thewliss relies on a combination of extra support for all pupils who are experiencing difficulties allied to a strong policy of discipline to raise standards. He said : "There is no magic pill which guarantees improvement and there is a lot of hard work involved, but we have tried to focus on certain areas where positive intervention can be achieved. We have introduced a very traditional supported study scheme where we ask youngsters where the problems are and then go back to the staff and identify to teachers where problems lie. Virtually all of my staff are involved in supported study thanks to the support of the local authority and money we have put in ourselves. On individual subjects we have also looked at exam results and identified strengths and weaknesses. That identifies areas where improvements can be made. It doesn't provide instant solutions, but over the four years we have been working on this we are now seeing positive results."
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