to think if we fund religious schools through taxes, DD should be considered for a place?

[experiencethis]

I'm not originally from the UK, so maybe I am missing the point here. It puzzles me that whilst some religious schools are (partially) government-funded by taxpayers, they do not treat all as equals when allocating places. Our local state CoE primary is lovely and walking distance from our house. But looking at the local authority's website we'd have to get the local CoE church to validate that we are part of the congregation (which we aren't) and attend service a number of times per quarter (which we don't). DH and I would be happy for DD to attend a religious school, we think exposing her to different faiths and beliefs will make her a well-rounded adult (we have Jewish, Catholics and Buddists in the wider family). She will then be able to decide on any of them or none at all as she pleases. AIBU ?

Shhhhh hmmmWonderwonder they really won't let us in ever if you slag off their gods.

And there are non-faith schools where selection is biased towards very middle class populations. It may not be written down but it is obvious some will take from a very narrow pop action base.

And yes - if you are really anti religion then why should a faith school matter to you? If it's just because the alternatives are crap then that is unfair to you but you really cannot moan that "my child is not going to be considered". Or if you are then you need to be lobbying anyone who will listen about the poor choice.

I said ages back that faith schools should have to take a good proportion of children from it's local area - in fact a good 50%. I think DS's school achieves this but whether that will be the case in a few years with the influx of European immigrants from Catholic countries remains to be seen.

The statistics don't seem to reflect that non-faith schools do this as much as faith schools.

Reasons it matters:

1. It might be the closest school
2. It might be the closest 5 schools
3. It might be where their friends go
4. It might have the best results
5. I pay for it so why shouldn't I?
6. It segregates children by religion because that is awesome
7. I can't choose a school with no religion because of compulsory mainly Christian worship in schools so if I have to put up with it, why can't I get DD into the best school?
8. Anyone else want to join in?

Plain old fashioned fairness, why should children of non religious parents be discriminated against.

Education is selective though.
It usually selects on grounds of parental income.
Choosing children who live nearest to the school is a prime example.
The primary where my children went was not our catchment school.
There was not a single property in that village which we could have afforded to buy, seriously, we looked into it. Also there were no houses which were not privately owned. Anyway I got my children a place in the school and if it had meant that I had to visit church everyday then that is what I would have done.
I do feel that there should be a committment to the ethos of the school from parents though, that's just my opinion.
Oh and as for high school we had to go to our local one and not the feederschool. Several parents did say that they would not be seen dead letting their children attend the high school mine attend. It performs just as well as the feeder school but is (Shock, horror) in a ROUGH AREA.

Shocking Christiano-phobia on this site but that is normal on mumsnet. But the ignorance: Christians don't believe in pixies in the sky... though maybe you were just trying to be offensive.

Few facts either but truth is there are something like 31 per cent of ethnic minorities in Catholic primary schools compared to 26 per cent in community schools in England. And 19 per cent of kids in Catholic primary schools live in the most deprived postcodes compared to around 14 in community schools.

If such schools are so bad why are they often the most oversubscribed - money well spent I say on educating the children of this country.

BlinkBlink can we have the source of your statistics please.

Source is government education statistics... dfe.gov.uk

My kids are at a state faith school.

I think YABU as its open to you to attend the church etc etc. If you aren't prepared to attend church x times a year then I think YABU to want to send your children to a faith school.

re: costs - the government pays 90% of capital costs so parents/church have to fund the rest, plus they don't own the building or land. The state pays for the secular teachers but not the religious instruction. My kids education therefore costs the government a little less than if they attended the local primary school..

BlinkBlink
Strangely enough not everyone seems to see things the same way
www.guardian.co.uk/education/2012/mar/05/church-schools-shun-poorest-pupils

I'm afraid that your statistics don't quite chime with the research published in the article.

BlinkBlink

Strangely enough your stats do seem to be a direct quote from the Catholic Education Service rather than the Department for Education

co-incidence I'm sure!

Personal opinions on the nature of supernatural belief systems usually shed more heat than light and have a tendency to derail the debate.

Blink, I'm curious about those statistics because I didn't realise the percentage of children who'd be classed as 'ethnic minority' was >25% in England as a whole. I'm not saying it isn't, just a bit suprised.

I think YABU to want to send your children to a faith school.
But forever, many people don't want to send their child to a faith school. They just want to be able to have equal access to local schools. The OP wanted to send her child to the local school but they 'do not treat all as equals when allocating places'.

'It's open to you to attend the church'.

That doesn't suggest you value your church very much, tbh. If you're perfectly happy for a bunch of non-believers to rock up, sit quietly at the back, bag access to your 'state faith school' for their own kids...well, we're back to seeker's juggling school.

We are selecting 'children who have parents who value education enough to inconvenience themselves a bit.' Nothing more, nothing less.

Nothing to do with those children's needs or their abilities.

Hardly comes under WWJD.

I think YABU as its open to you to attend the church etc etc. If you aren't prepared to attend church x times a year then I think YABU to want to send your children to a faith school.

the government pays 90% of capital costs

You really don't see the problem with this... It isn't about wanting to send my child to a faith school, it is about wanting to send my child to a good school, a local school, a school her friends attend. I don't want to have to either lie or support a system I don't believe in to do that. If you want faith schools, pay for the whole thing yourselves!

MrsTP - I see no more problem with faith schools than I do grammar schools, VC schools or private schools etc. The debate should be why are community schools not as good as you would want. A poor performing faith school should close just as much as a coasting grammar school. As for paying for the whole thing ourselves - well of course we already do + a bit extra.... so there

Blink - I thought on MN the debate should be whatever the OP wants. For many of us what's not good about the non-faith schools is simply that they're not near enough!

GrimmatheNome - I know and councils are withdrawing transport services for children attending such schools. Can't remember what OP said but the idea that we don't pay in full and more for our children's education in state faith schools is, how can I say, totally unbelievable. I

BlinkBlink
I like a reasonably deprived area - within top 30% on index of multiple deprivation when I lived 7 mins walk away it was in the top 15-16% on the IMD. Flats where I live now are upwards of half a million for a 2 bed and are around three hundred thousand in the more deprived area.

You can live in a deprived area and not be poor at all that is why Free School Meals is a better test than simply living in a deprived area and might explain the discrepancy between the CES figures and the Guardian research.

What more do you pay - 10% of the capital costs which the LEA has the discretion to waive!

blink - have councils ever paid for parents to be able to send their children to non-faith schools? I thought it was only ever to faith schools.

Of course you pay in full for your childs education - I can't spot where anyone implied you didn't. But so do all of us. Heck, I paid in full and then had to pay again because the state system hereabouts is so unrepresentative.

Chazs you are right the FSM figure is lower in Catholic schools (just by about 5% from memory, but lower). There might be many reasons for that but point is that in general Catholic schools are not as a whole radically different in terms of social/ethnic intake from community schools. By all means people can call for the end to state faith schools but do it on more legitimate grounds rather than suggesting that they are havens of middle classes.
Actually why I think that, in general, they are good schools is because they have a clearer understanding of the purpose of education that community schools. That's where the debate should really be

Grimma - MrsTP amongst others believes that we should pay in full for faith schools ourselves if we want them. She probably knows that we already do plus a good bit more but hey why let the facts get in the way of religio-phobic outrage.

People are entitled to believe in what they want to believe where religion is concerned. They should be able to do this without the name calling or derision such as I have read on this thread - personally it might be your belief but if that is the case why all the wailing that your child is being denied a place in a school which is based on the "claptrap/fairy story" you sneer at. Tax funded or not - it is surely not the school for you BUT.....

I still believe that if the school up the road is Catholic (or any other religion) then you should have a good liklihood of getting your child in if that is where you want him/her to attend.

Someone up thread mentioned all the reasons why the faith school might matter (even if you are not religious). I don't think I disagree with any of them and said as much in my previous post which hers was responding to. I still do not understand why you would really want it if you are of the "sneer at religion" presuasion though.

Church schools should take from the local community - and I say that as a card carrying Catholic. Howwver, I was not a "card carrying Catholic" or even "Catholic" when my DS joined his school - he was not baptised and I did not even attend church. Yet he still got a place - and I feel all children local to a school should be in with a shot of a place there - religious or not, church attenders or not. That would stop all the "school place seeking" church goers because they would have a decent chance of a place regardless.

Actually why I think that, in general, they are good schools is because they have a clearer understanding of the purpose of education that community schools. That's where the debate should really be

No, no, no! Talking about if and why faith schools perform better is simply a distraction, the debate is about the inequality of access to state funded schools on the basis of parental religion. Every thing else is a separate issue.

And still none of the faith school apologists have addressed the NHS analogy, I wonder why???