To wonder why non-believers send their doc to faith schools

[Latetothematch]

Not a thread about a thread but thought whilst reading a thread when reading 'dc goes to a faith school and comes home with questions but we don't believe'.

Why send your child to a school where you do not believe what it is teaching?

Most village primary schools were originally set up and run by the church.After education became compulsory, they started being handed over to the state on the condition that they maintained their religious character and diocese inspections still take place evety few years to make sure that this is the case
.Realistically the government will have to find sites and funding to replace all these schools if they want all schools to be non-religious.

exactly initgrand.
It's not an ideal situation but it's what we have.

The Church of England is rubbing its hands with glee at the prospect of opening even more CofE schools as academies, according to this report:

www.churchofengland.org/media/1418393/the%20church%20school%20of%20the%20future%20review%20-%20march%202012[1].pdf

Or just change the law. It wouldn't be the first time. But the government doesn't want all schools to be non-religious. They actually appear to want schools to be more religious, and to open more religious schools even though the proportion of the population with any religious faith is dropping.

Sorry, the end fell off :

www.churchofengland.org/media/1418393/the%20church%20school%20of%20the%20future%20review%20-%20march%202012[1].pdf

Well do 3/4 of people in your town actively participate in a religious life? If not then you can suspect that they didn't choose a church school out of desire for a religious education but because of a need to choose the best available state school when location and results are taken into account.

And yes the schools were set up by the church. But when it was the establishment church and mostly funded by the local community the decent thing the church should do now is akwknowledge the unfair advantage they had for setting these schools up and release their religious control on them.

Catholic schools etc which were set up by minority groups in the community are more difficult, but the CofE should realise that some of its historical community activities should be treated as charitable not used to control the modern population. This would then mean that the majority of religious schools would become community schools and the CofE would no longer hold a monopoly on state schooling in some areas of the country.

Pachacuti, that's pretty much what the report I tried to link to was saying. The CofE sees the changes in schools provision as a wonderful opportunity to open more church schools as academies.

Under the old system with, as you say, fewer bums on seats with every passing year, the Church's influence on education in schools would have diminished.

mrsminiverscharlady did you mean that to sound so offfensive? Oh yes. Of course you did.

I thought it was still ok to make fun of religious people in this country, Orange.

Or have they sneaked in a blasphemy law while I wasn't looking?

intitgrand the Church didn't just magically come to own the land and have the money for church buildings. The Church didn't make an economic contribution. It took the sweat of other men's brows and commandeered it. Tithing was an early form of taxation (or demanding money with menaces) and as such the land and buildings should belong to us all. Renationalise the land; disestablish the Church! I'm not entirely joking...

DD would have gone to a C of E school because all the schools around here are C of E. Fortunately a new free school opened in time for September a stones throw from our house so she goes there.

Latetothematch even in your small town what happens to the child whose parents are Hindu, Pagan, Buddhist etc.

Will they not be forced to choose between worshipping Allah, Jehovah or Jesus?.

Can anyone tell me what happens nowadays to a child who opts out of worshipping the headmaster's favorite god?. Are they not in effect given detention for that period?

itshowwedo That's what I was saying. Maybe we should start a government petition?

itshowwedo I agree with that and see nothing to stop us. Though in practice if the church had to pay the same taxes as everyone else we'd get the land back eventually anyway.

Equal Rights for Religions! :)

DH and I disagree strongly with organised religion, but hopefully both DCs will be going to a CofE school. The reason for that is that, of the 3 schools nearby, only 1 is non-denominational, and it has an appalling reputation which is backed up by poor OFSTED results. I won't pretend to believe something I don't to get them in though.

When my ds was due to start school, the town had 6 schools, of which 5 were C of E. We chose a school but he was allocated another and we didn't fit any of the reasons for appealing (like sibling links). So we sent him to a C of E school where the head said she didn't do anything more than the minimum required by law re assembly. Even if we had got a place at the one non-religious school, which at the time had a bad reputation (and this was before OFSTED reports), I'd have struggled to send him there as it was half an hour's walk away and at that age he'd have taken an hour to walk it.

Then there was a change of head at his school and an increase in religious involvement. The new head thought Christianity was good for everyone and disapproved of us taking our ds out of assembly and church services. We moved away from the area when he was 7.

Suburban Rhonda, gcse re is not compulsory in non church secondaries but studying re in key stage four is therefore most schools think that as the child has to study it then they may swell get a qualification out of it. If you kicked up a fuss and asked not to do the gcse your child wouldn't be able to take another subject because they would still be in the compulsory re lesson.

may as well not may swell

I went to a CofE school as a teen. There was no other choice in our small town.

It's looking like no choice. We are looking at secondaries but dd is non verbal. No mainstream wants her, the local SN schools are all for learning disabilities (she has none) and offer no GCSE's. The only school for 50 miles that offers GCSE's for physically disabled children is a Catholic one. And they are very catholic.
I am pissed off that a, she cant go to mainstream and b, we may be forced into a catholic school 45 miles away where non verbal disabled children will be preached at

I avoided all the religious schools in my area as I'm an atheist and I'd rather dd made up her own mind up when she's older. DD is at a state primary but still being taught Christian stories as fact in lessons. It isn't right that parents can't opt out of this.

Village school - CofE
Nearest state school to DS's CofE School is 30 mins drive.

Sancti I'd be furious too :(

That's really interesting, useless and would explain why he has to do the GCSE.

So how come you can opt out of RE lessons in primary but not secondary?

Sancti, that is heartbreaking.