Friend won appeal based on lie

Good for your friend!
Apart from the fact I don’t think you have the whole story anyway…
The one area where I think “thou shalt lie” is definitely around ridiculous faith criteria in state schools.

Of course, it's wrong to lie. It's fraudulent.

But I can't get terribly upset about fraudulent information being used to bypass an admissions process that is, in itself, immoral and discriminatory.

Why is it any of your business? Genuinely...why?? There should be NO faith based discrimination for any child to attend a school. Ever!

@EmberAsh Faith schools shouldn't exist in my opinion and the admission criteria are setting the schools up for lies and deception.

You are offending this way people who are truly religious.For Catholic schools the requirements are often very strict e.g. child has to be baptised within the first half a year of their life, priests checking presence after the masses etc

Aren't the property prices driven around the top comprehensive also a lie and deception? People move just to get in and then they move out once they got in

I don't know about CoE but nobody who doesn't have at least Catholic origin ( non practicing baptised Catholic) and would send their kid to Catholic school.

Simply the amount of Catholic brainwashing they do there is not for people of a different faith: RE twice a week, masses, retreats with priest etc etc

It is not easy to completely fake to be Catholic.

Catholic secondary schools are not only about prayers at the beginning of the day and the end. It is a whole elaborate mind conditioning

If it makes you feel better, the child will know that they have received the place by deceit which will have repercussions.

It's very possible that the child will not know what machinations their parents went through to secure the place. But, if the child did believe that they received the place by deceit, the repercussion may well be that they learn that it's worth it to lie.

Does it matter? If they had attended for 2 years with no religious values purely to get into the school would they be any better morally? Faith schools shouldn't exist in my opinion and the admission criteria are setting the schools up for lies and deception.

Do you all think Muslim schools should be abolished, or just CofE?

Do you think muslims should open up thier school sto let your children attend?

Funny how its always CofE that should be done away with 🙄

My friend’s local Catholic school and associated church has a register to sign at church and this is used for applications. I can’t tell you the fiddling that goes on there with friends signing in for each other etc.

But there are parishes in most cases where the priest stands outside after mass and in his notebook marks every parent coming to him to sign up

What about grammar school that discriminate basing on performance@SoupDragon ?

Or what about discrimination based on affluence in top comprehensive around which the prices of property are skyrocketing?

I am asking - why to target as discrimination only faith schools and not other schools too?

all new faith schools until recently had a rule of acceptance of 50% non faith/ other faith pupils and that apparently didn't work

My friend’s local Catholic school and associated church has a register to sign at church and this is used for applications. I can’t tell you the fiddling that goes on there with friends signing in for each other etc.

I had my children baptised as Catholics to get them into the good school. I’m certainly not alone.

It's the priest fault and he should have practiced what he preaches about lying and falsehoods

So you think religious discrimination is perfectly acceptable?

The others are irrelevant as this is about religion.

Imagine a state funded hospital that discriminated based on religion.

But then, state schools should not discriminate based on the amount of money the parents have- and expensive properties near well-performing state schools.

Also, Grammar schools are discrimination and in so called county grammars where acceptance is of up to 24% of the top performing cohort it drowns the local state schools down down down. Terrible segregation

So either there should not be any discrimination including driving property prices up around schools.... or keep it as it is.

I couldn't get worked up about this. Our kids go to a church of England school too with the same admissions criteria. It's the best school in the area and nearly everyone we know had lied about their church attendance to get in! Others started going to church even though they weren't religious simply to get their child into the school. As soon as they got a place they stopped going to church.
Yes, it's unethical but people are happy to be slightly dishonest if it's in the best interests of their child.

Meh.

Like others have said, state education shouldn't be allowed to discriminate based on faith.

so what? The priests in many parishes check and note only attendance to the masses for 1 yeatr. Honestly, they would go completely mad if after each mass they would check the presence of every single family for 5 years.

If you are so jealous why you have not started attending and baptised your child?

How can you possibly know if someone was / was not watching an online service each Sunday morning?

I’m not sure you have the right facts here op. Your ‘friend’ would have completed the church attendance paperwork when they first applied, and the decision would have been based on that information. They then appealed and provided different church attendance paperwork? From a different church? And then got a place? It just doesn’t ring true.

What difference will this make to your life?

Exactly. They could have put themselves on the church electoral roll in 2020 and couldn't attend until they started going.

Mind your own business 🙄

I doubt you are a ‘friend’ and your concern is probably jealousy based on hearsay.

A panel would look at all the evidence and not rely on a random letter. It’s likely the appeal was allowed on completely different grounds which they are perfectly entitled to not share with you.

Whether there is a faith criteria in your admissions policy can depend on the Diocese. Our Diocese stipulates that CofE schools should not have a faith criteria as they are inclusive not faith schools. Most of the CofE Primaries are in villages/small towns with no other school in the catchment area.

The priest lied on the form? Can't trust anyone 😂

There’s no school good enough to make me sit through church services for two years.