Faith Schools And Racial Segregation?

When my mother used to teach in a RC school (not in a big city) they had quite a few Muslim pupils because many Muslim parents thought that the Catholic ethos/moral values (leaving aside specific religious teaching) would suit them better than a non-church school. This was in an area where the school wasn't oversubscribed, though, obviously. They also had a lot of Polish/Lithuanian families and children from the traveller community. There are schools and schools and it's hard to generalise.

Personally, though, I'm opposed to faith schools in general. Abolishing faith-based selection would be a start.

There's two reasons I'll choose a faith school over anything else. I'm guessing the same two reasons as every other parent.

1. it's by far the best performing school
2. it teaches the basic tenets of my faith

I couldn't give a rats ass what colour the kids are or sex.

"Meditrina how many Pakistani Bangledeshi Somalian Bengali East European Muslim children are in your local Catholic schools?"

Don't know exactly. As quoted above, it's pretty much in line with the Census stats quoted above: lots of newish arrivals from Eastern Eurooe (they go to Church, they find out about schools fom that community, they use them), and South Americans. Not that familiar with the school, but think there are usually a few families from the Phillipines too.

If there is a demand for atheist education (not sure if that's what gardenfeature is after) there are more possibilities now under the free school policy (would need a waiver about "collective worship" in same way as Muslim and Jewish school have, and the RE it must offer would be handled in the same way too).

Faith schools exist because churches, synagogues, mosques and temples founded them - many welll before state education existed at all (CofE in particular to educate all children in their parish, not just religious families). Now, with free school funding, groups do not have to fundraise extensive for a generation or two to set up, nor do they/their church have to raise the 10% capital costs, nor deal with the extra bureaucracy if dealing with both Church owners/funders and govt funders over land/buildings/maintenance/alterations etc. It's a good time to make the point by doing it, and doing it well.

Though most CofE schools are VC (fully community criteria), and also with VA schools (which may allocate some or all places by application of churchgoing activity), are more community focussed and agnostic than outsiders realise. And the loose liturgical stance of CofE does mean that just about anything short of advocating crime or satanism counts as "broadly Christian".

To clarify,

1. Baptised catholic in care
2. Catholic feeder school
3. Other baptised catholic
4. In care non-catholic
5. Other christian community
6. Other faith non-christian
7. Other children

Of the three other local schools, two have "statement of educational needs" first followed by local authority and then disabled needing accessiblity. The third, an academy has local authority first but like the catholic school no mention of SEN.

You would have thought that the religious school should be setting an example in the morally right thing to do here by putting SEN kids, disabled kids and kids in care at the top of their priority list.

Our local catholic has an admissions hierarchy with athiests at the bottom:

1. Baptisted catholic
2. In care non-catholic
3. Other christian community
4. Other faith non-christian
5. Other children

Very strange in this day and age that this can be going on...

OP, its also worth pointing out that apart from the UK are only 3 other OECD countries that allow admissions policies that segregate children by faith: the Irish Republic, Estonia and Israel. (See here)

It's only allowed here because of an exemption from the 2010 Equality Act.

Some more background from the census digest (linked in my previous post):

Para 27: "Catholic schools had higher proportions in most ethnic categories apart from the Asian/Asian British"

Para 28: "the number of pupils classified as white Eastern European increased substantially, from 1.6% of the total in 2012 to 2.5% in 2013.

Para 31: "There was a group of six dioceses with more than 84% white British pupils: Liverpool, Hexham & Newcastle, Lancaster, Middlesbrough, Plymouth and Shrewsbury.... The most ethnically mixed dioceses, with fewer than 45% white British pupils, were Brentwood, Northampton, Southwark and Westminster...

Sorry Pebbly - cross posted.

Pebbly, answering my own question, I think your numbers are probably from the Catholic Education Service's most recent census of Catholic schools.

They define an ethnic group as anything other than "White British".

For reference, the full list of groups is:

White British
White Irish
White Eastern European
White other
Traveller of Irish/Gypsy/Roma heritage
mixed/dual
Asian/Asian British
Black/Black British
Chinese
Other ethnic group
Not known

I'm not forgetting that minority ethnic includes white Europeans, I'm just not lumping all white people in with 'white British'

Source is Catholic Education service census 2013, completed by 98% of Catholic schools.

I'm rural. Most schools are 100% white or maybe 1-2 non white children. The Catholic school is by far the most ethnically diverse. I'm not extrapolating this to mean that every Catholic school is more ethnically diverse than it's neighbours but nor am I accepting that because the London Oratory is white dominated then that means that all Catholic schools are more ethnically uniform (and white) than other schools.

33% ethnic minority?
Not round here.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnic_groups_in_the_United_Kingdom

Pebbly, the national average hides a lot of variation. Out of interest, where do your numbers come from? Can you post a link to your source?

Don't forget that the phrase "minority ethnic" includes many white Europeans from Catholic countries, such as Ireland and Poland, so high numbers don't necessarily reflect full diversity in areas where there are many non-Christians. If one school contains all of the local Christians, and its neighbouring school contains all of the local non-Christians, that isn't good, even if there are a wide range of groups within each of the two communities.

The Fair Admissions Campaign looks at socio-economic segregation, and has published a heat map showing the impact of segregated admissions across the UK. See here: fairadmissions.org.uk/groundbreaking-new-research-maps-the-segregating-impact-of-faith-school-admissions/.

Catholic primaries have more minority ethnic pupils than the national average (33% compared to 27%) though I take your point wrt London in general and LO in particular.

OP you may be interested to know that the London diocese does not approve of faith selection, www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/10205477/No-places-for-churchgoers-in-newly-opened-faith-schools.html Sadly though school governors seem determined to stick with a practise that confers privilege on parents willing to sit in pews and inhibits diversity. Schools have to consult on admissions arrangements so it might be worthwhile, as well as highlighting your case to the Fair Admissions Campaign, to watch out for when there is next a consultation at local CofE schools and highlight the issues.

You might also want to join together with others top form a local pressure group on the model of the ones in Richmond and Hammersmith. www.richmondinclusiveschools.org.uk/

The Fair Admission Campaign have a lot of evidence of how faith schools, including Roman Catholic Schools, do not mirror the social and ethnic diversity of the areas they serve. The reasons are simple, where they are oversubscribed, then you need the knowledge and resources to meet the faith criteria. In the case of Oratory that is very demanding, you have to have baptised by 6 months (not the custom in a lot of countries, even Catholic ones eg Poland), and you have to get involved in all sorts of church activities to earn the brownie points to enter the lottery. They are currently challenging a ruling that their selection criteria is discriminatory www.leftfootforward.org/2014/04/religiously-selective-schools-criticised-by-the-office-of-the-childrens-commissioner/

The state should not be funding any form of segregation

by god by gonads or by "brains" ( which is actually parental ability to pay for tutoring )

you want selection / segregation - go pay for it

whyjustwhyagain said: "Why not ask why do we allow children to be segregated by sex?" Or academic ability? Or by house price lottery?"

People do ask those questions, frequently. There are many debates about those issues too.

"I don't think you can look at any of these issues in isolation. Either accept that they happen, or try to change them all."

I think the only way you will address any of these issues is by looking at them in isolation, because they are all very different. It's much easier to address complex problems by breaking them down into smaller problems and tackling them individually, provided you keep an appropriate sense of perspective about the bigger picture too, and acknowledge where issues overlap.

OP, I'd second the suggestion that you should read up on the Fair Admissions Campaign, and tell them about your experiences. They're doing good work in this area and making political headway.

I must say that some of the RC schools have a diverse intake. A lot of kids from African families, Philippines, South America, Poland etc. For some reason less of these kids go to Oratory and CV. I have noticed the CofE schools tend to be more white middle class though.

Unfortunately the largest minorities around here are North African or from countries where Muslims predominate and are effectively excluded from applying. I live in a borough which currently has only one non faith school.

Did you want your DS to go there?