Faith Schools - state funding

[pearlym]

am I being unreasonable to think that it is unfair that faith schools get 85% plus funding frmo the state but that they are effectively closed to children not of their faith?

I think yanbu but I also think that those children who are going to be accepted would have to go to a school anyway paid for by the state.

So the fact that they all go to one school because they happen to be catholic or whatever it doesn't really matter how the children are divided if you swim and it still works out that the state isn't picking up the whole tab

So the land is part of a private trust - but the upkeep is funded by the whole community, whether they are Catholic, & therefore able to access the school, or not.

I can see how these situations have arisen historically. I can't see how anyone would regard it as desirable, though.

Well, unless you are in the favoured local group that gets an extra layer of choice AND you like the idea of segregating children according to parental faith.

I'm really uncomfortable with it tbh - kids are very 'tribal' when it comes to which school they attend. Directly correlating that with background is horribly divisive.

It depends on how you look at it. You can say the land is part of a private trust - but the upkeep is funded by the whole community, whether they are Catholic, & therefore able to access the school, or not.

Or you can say

The land is owned by the church and the upkeep is part state funded and part church funded and the school can be accessed by Catholics and the remaining places given to non Catholics with all children being subbed by the church.

The state is obliged to fund the education of Catholic children as well as non Catholics. If faith schools did disappear, and we disregard the matter of the land etc., the overall cost of education would rise rather than the money that is currently spent on educating children in faith schools being diverted to other schools and all the Catholics being burned at the stake HE or privatly educated or something. Those children don't just vanish.

Any school which applies its admissions criteria becomes selective/decisive. The only way around that would be to have a lottery system which is a logistical nightmare and seems to please no-one.

The land is owned by the Catholic community. The school was built and paid for by the Catholic community. It's madness to suggest that the Catholic community shouldn't benefit from it.

It is a different matter with Church of England schools. The constitution of the Church of England is that it is there to serve everyone in the country. Everyone in the country is a member of the church, whether they like it or not. Therefore it could be argued that selection based on church attendance is wrong.

Most faith school's here in the SW take any religion, catholic school up the road has Muslim's, Catholics, christians and probably others. I went to a churh of england school and had friends who were JW's. 99% of the schools here are faith schools so they would not be able to turn other religions away (or there would be nowhere for them to go).

I forgot to include that in the Catholic parish near where I lived, current church members paid a tithe which went towards upkeep of the Catholic schools in the diocese. The money isn't coming out of the church coffers, it's coming out of the pockets of Catholic taxpayers.

But the church is only chipping in 15%.

I'm not saying it's an inconsiderable amount - of course it isn't - but it doesn't justify this degree of distortion of availability.

If there are 5 schools in a town, & one is aided by a faith group, that's actually only 3% of the budget.

I would prefer schools to admit on the basis of identified need (looked after children, SEN), distance from school & siblings - which is how LA schools generally do it. I agree with you that it's an imperfect system, but I believe that schools should represent the local community in all its diversity.

'Everyone in the country is a member of the church, whether they like it or not'

Where are you getting that from? I'm an unbaptised atheist. I'm reasonably sure that neither I nor Buddhist dh could claim to be members of the C of E, established church or not.

But if you substituted 'Tory'/'BNP/ 'the filthy rich' for 'Catholic' there would be uproar and quite rightly so. Members of the community are being excluded and are having less choice than the select few. It needs abolishing.

Kladdkaka - that just isn't true. If the church considers me to be a member then they are very slow to get in touch and have never mentioned it to me. I am sure that my local CofE church would welcome me, but so would every church provided that I followed their particular philosophy, it doesn't make me a member of the church.

Yanbu

If a religion funds 15% of the school, they should be able to select 15% of the pupils. No more.

It was being talked about on the BBC recently. The Bishop of Somewhereorother said it's in the constitution of the church. Sorry, I can't remember more than that.

I suspect either you or His Bishness have got it muddled, then.

At least, I hope so, because the kids' devoutly Muslim nanny would be quite appalled at being pressganged into the C of E, for a start.

I know we atheists are quite often considered unreasonable for not wanting to participate in the church, on the peculiar basis that we obviously aren't that bothered & should just mumble along...but I'd be very surprised if they're allowed to bags other congregations as well.

They can certainly include me out...

ravenAk your devout muslim nanny will believe that everyone is born a muslim

The Prophet Muhammad said, "No babe is born but upon Fitra (as a Muslim). It is his parents who make him a Jew or a Christian or a Polytheist." (Sahih Muslim, Book 033, Number 6426)
Islam is the religion of all Prophets, Adam to Muhammad. Children are not born out of any sin, original, inherited or derived. They are born on the religion of their nature, i.e., Islam.

www.islam101.com/dawah/newBorn.htm

so why cant some bishop think everyone is born a christian?

Even if we are all 'Christians', we won't get first dibs on oversubscribed C of E school places. The admissions criteria will say something like 'regular members of church A, church B' etc.

In any other walk of life, discrimination against people on the grounds of religious belief is considered wrong, and is illegal. So why is it acceptable to discriminate against children in the education sector based on the faith of their parents?

YANBU. Catholic secondary on our doorstep yet my DCs have not a cat in hell's chance of getting in because they're not religious (and I won't pretend to be religious either like a lot of the hypocrites around here!).

If they want to be so exclusive, they should fund themselves. Then again, I don't agree with faith schools anyway - school should be about education, not fairytales.

Kladdkaka raises good points...we can argue against it till the cows come home but we can't afford the solution.

The solution is simple: just require voluntary aided faith schools to abide by the same admissions criteria as voluntary controlled and community schools.

OP, YANBU, but the church contribution is rather tinier than 15%. The state provides all the of running costs of voluntary aided faith schools and 90% of the capital costs. It's a very good deal indeed for the schools, especially for those in deprived urban areas, as their admissions policies mean that they are able to avoid many of the difficult issues that community schools face in these areas.

But the state provide none of the capital investment. You are proposing state seizure of private assets by stealth.

The church may own the buildings but the state is paying the money that runs the school and pays the wages of the staff. This is the vast vast majority of the annual budget. They should have a fairer admissions policy that actually reflects their local area. In fact, they should have the same admissions policy as all other schools. Christianity surely teaches them to accept others and reach out to them? They just don't want to because generally, in a lot of areas, faith schools are a form of white middle class selection.

That is a rather bizarre conclusion, kladdkaka. Really I am not.

My proposal is simply that all schools abide by the same rules on admissions. No need for schools to close or assets to be seized...

And if the church decides they want their land and buildings back the state will be up the creek without a paddle.

In our area the faith schools accept all sorts... they have to, because nearly all the primary schools are faith schools. So, the way it works is: If you don't want your child to go to a faith school you either have to try to get them into a non-faith one some distance away (where you will be low priority because they prioritise by distance), or else go private if you can. If you're not too bothered then you either have to play the church attendance game for a few years beforehand or you will be low on the priority list and so you probably won't get a place at the better schools.

So, children are discriminated against based on what their parents may or may not believe/whether they have the time and inclination to attend church.

Kladdkaka I think you would find the churches up a different creek but equally paddleless if they had to pay to maintain all their land and buildings. It is an arrangement of mutual convenience.