Is RE a mandatory GCSE subject?

No, but my DD1 tells me it's very interesting.

More schools probably do not do the same because they see the inherent value in the subject, they would struggle to find a way to accommodate the children elsewhere without providing extra teachers and not spending more money. The children removed are also supposed to have an alternative arranged which suits their RE needs.

Information link here ..... www.secularism.org.uk/your-rights--withdrawal-from-re.html

DCs school handed the form to anybody who wanted it - as it frees up their timetable space.
Daft that more schools do not do the same.

RE is *not compulsory in KS4
neither as a GCSE nor a lesson
unless the school is a faith school

any non faith school will be able to provide you with the 'opt out form' so that your child does not need to attend RE lessons in Year 10 and 11

OP you would be very lucky if a secondary school offers computer science. Most will try to steer you towards ICT which can be very dull and undemanding and is not an academic preparation for computer science (as someone else said the more maths the better).

My DS1 is a fervent atheist but loved the RE GCSE because of it's philosophy content. His school ended up cancelling the RE class to allow the students to use the time for core subjects, but a few including DS carried on at an after school class.

Yup, I've heard of it happening - not just on MN either. There are areas with a shortage of school places overall but undersubscribed faith schools. Don't know whether thatmum chose the RC school or not, but we can't presume she did.

In some places you might have to.

No choice but to send them to an RC secondary school? That would be extremely unusual, to put it mildly. Could you suggest somewhere that that's true?

presumably though, thatmum48, you don't have to send him to the Catholic school.....

In some places you might have to.

presumably though, thatmum48, you don't have to send him to the Catholic school.....

My son goes to a RC comprehensive school and they are forced to pick re for one of their 4 gcse subjects. Basically meaning they only have 3 choices. I do find this rather irritable to be frank.

Upthread someone suggested their school was breaking the law as did Citizenship not RSS at KS4. The KS4 requirements for RS can be met through 'citizenship'. We meet ours through a one hour a week lesson called 'personal development' which runs alongside the option RSS.

Depends what you mean by 'a career in computers' - I've written software for a living for over 25 years, hardly any formal training ... the entry level qualification for the sort of stuff I write is a PhD in chemistry because that's what our software is about, learning to code is the relatively easy part. (and yes, maths is essential). If he's interested in the hardware side I'd guess physics would be essential and electronics, if available, would be good.

DDs school would probably suit your DS ... RE GCSE not mandatory, they do a combination of RE/citizenship/PSHE/'beyond the curriculum' whatever that is for a total of an hour (or maybe two) a week during ks4, nothing like half a gcse's worth, nothing onerous. She would have liked to do it for GCSE despite (or because of) being a self-declared atheist, but not as much as she wanted to do computer science and electronics. (Apart from its being a girls' school, that is!)

a child who wants a career in computers

Is it that they want it, or you want it for them? If they want it, they'll figure it out. Job with Google? Good PhD in computer science. To do computer science at university, the requirement is maths, maths, maths, maths. There are very few serious computer science courses that don't require an A or A* in A Level Maths. Even they need a pretty good excuse as to why you haven't got it, and teach you equivalent maths in the first year as an extra requirement.

My DS is at a specialist computing and engineering school, he dropped ICT as soon as he could. No one was bothered when he wanted to study for a BTec in IT.

He learnt by playing games, then working on Minecraft and adapting others code, coding in Scratch. And the other key skill is Maths, which is what good Universities are looking for.

Colleges he looked at did want to ensure he knew IT was nothing like school ICT.

If someone wants to work in and has an aptitude for computers then they would be beyond the GCSE ICT syllabus well before they were 16. The new upcoming computer science GCSE is a different matter but the old ICT is almost pointless for most people.

You needed to check which subjects were mandatory at GCSE in your particular school before your dc started. My dc attend a faith school so RE GCSE is mandatory, I'd rather dc did something else but it's a humanity (well, not if you are Michael Gove), it teaches them to debate, see different viewpoints etc and it is not a particularly difficult GCSE so what's not to like really? I would much rather that they didn't have to do IT GCSE at their school which I DO think is a waste of time (the course content, not IT per se) as they seem to have spent five years getting to a point of competence which my dc, and probably many others in the year, passed somewhere in Year 8.

I just would prefer my DS to learn more computing rather than Philosophy

Which is funny, because here in computer science, we'd rather people learnt more Philosophy. Seriously: we have joint research programs with them. We'd also like people to be able to write essays, which they might get a leg up with. We couldn't give a toss about any of the content of GCSE ICT, which is almost completely worthless.

Dd's academy have opted out of the exam. It's great, they have gone from a frankly boring syllabus (what do Christians/Muslims/Jews believe about ....) practice for half a sodding gcse. Now they choose what they want to talk about. This week conspiracy theories, next week the banking crisis. They get the rare opportunity to have a mature debate about things outside the national curriculum and explore the wider world. previously it was oh shit is re-now its- oh great its ppre. not saying re doesn't have is place in understanding the world, but it was soooo dull and frankly not relevant. (as laid down in the NC not the school btw)

Well my son's school must be breaking the law, he did RE/PSHE in years 7 and 8, this was replaced by Citizenship in years 9 and 10 with the exam at the end of year 10. In year 11 he studied only English, Maths, Triple Science, his chosen GCSEs and ICT.

ICT is appallingly badly taught and another frequent waste of time.