To be sick of people slating Faith schools

[Jenga123]

Don't get me wrong I understand why some people may be against them but the negativity I've come across recently is, quite frankly ridiculous. I've been told by friends of friends, family etc that they pay for my dd's to attend their catholic primary and secondary schools and that tax payers that are paying towards these schools should not have to do so if their children can't attend these schools. Well let me just say the average amount of income tax each individual pays, that actually goes towards the upkeep of schools is minuscule, so they aren't in fact paying for them. Myself and the other parents of my dd's schools pay a considerable sum each year to the upkeep of the school and the school contributes 10% towards the costs of running their school and repairs etc.

I also come across animosity at the fact my children are getting a good education and people putting that down to them simply being baptised. But my point is if they feel that their own children are missing out by going to a less desirable school then I'm sure they could have them baptised therefor giving them a higher chance of securing a place at a faith school, and whilst I'm not advocating people pretending to be of the faith, I'm simply saying there are options.

As for my dd's schools like I said they are Catholic and are obviously places were parents of the same faith opt to send their children as they want them to be educated within that faith, and I can't see any problem with this to be honest so why am I hearing nothing but negativity from people?

Gnome you are right no child needs to attend a faith school likewise no Muslim child needs to eat Halal for example, or Hindu wore a turban, BUT religious parents desire these things in accordance with their faith.

"Gnome you are right no child needs to attend a faith school.....BUT religious parents desire these things in accordance with their faith."

As I said- they won't be applying to non faith schools, then, will they? Cool. All sorted.

That would be illegal, Soupdragon, so the question doesn't arise.

Bertrandrussell what we really need is more Catholic schools as the Polish and Filipino communities are particularly devout.

And "bucking the trend", Bertram? What trend would that be and where did it come from?
The undersubscribed, faith-based admissions criteria school near me is also by far the highest FSM one. Is that bucking some sort of trend, too?
To be honest, I'm struggling to see your point about FSM. Some schools are in poor areas and their uptake of FSM is higher. It's nothing to do with their religious background, or are you saying religious families don't need FSM?

"d "bucking the trend", Bertram? What trend would that be and where did it come from?
The undersubscribed, faith-based admissions criteria school near me is also by far the highest FSM one. Is that bucking some sort of trend, too?"

It's undersubscribed. You will probably also discover that it's results are no better than other schools in the area.

Oversubscribed faith schools tend to have significantly lower levels of children on FSM than non faith schools in the same catchment.

Oversubscribed faith schools tend to have significantly lower levels of children on FSM than non faith schools in the same catchment.

Is that because oversubscribed schools tent to be better schools, which inflates house prices in the area, therefore there is a lower take up of FSM. Nothing to do with faith?

It is absolutely nothing to do with faith.

Neither are the good results that oversubscribed faith schools tend to get.

It is back door selection.

How do you find out the percentage of children on free school meals at a given school?

I expect the data is going to be skewed a bit now that all infants have free school meals. Presumably parents might not get round to applying until year 3, if the meals are free anyway without them having to apply?

Plenty of services I pay for I'll never access even if I wanted to - at least with faith schools, if you're that determined to 'get in' then you can become a catholic. No one is stopping you doing that.

Seriously, Surfer, if you can't see how utterly irrational that is as an argument, you need to have a word with yourself.

What we really need is more Catholic schools as the Polish and Filipino communities are particularly devout.

Why, Hels? Why do Catholics' children have to be devout in school? Can't they give them all the religious education they need at home and through their local churches? If a large section of the community developed worshipping Jediism, would we "really need" loads of Jedi schools?

you are right no child needs to attend a faith school.....BUT religious parents desire these things in accordance with their faith.

Fine. They and their faith leaders should pay for what they desire, not expect the rest of the community to subsidise the desired object and then refuse to let them use what they're subsidising.

here ineedacheeseslicer.

(I got mine from Tesco, by the way)

not expect the rest of the community to subsidise the desired object

Parents of children at religious schools pay taxes towards non-religious schools too.

Veritat that was in response to Bertrandrussell who didn't want faith children accessing non faith school. If there were more faith schools they probably wouldn't.

These statistics relating to free school meals are from A House of Commons Briefing Paper 06972 14th October 2015

In January 2015 just under 12.4% of pupils at state funded primary faith schools were eligible for free school meals compared to just over 16.4% of all primaries. Rates at faith secondary schools were slightly below average (14.3% v 14.9%). 26% of pupils at faith primary schools had an ethnic background other than White British,25 again below the primary average (31%). There were actually higher rates of minority ethnic pupils in faith secondary schools than the overall secondary average (32% v 29%).

This is a lis of the different types of religious schools in the UK. How on earth can it help promote a harmonious country by separating children into different groups.

Church of England
Roman Catholic
Methodist
Other Christian
Jewish
Muslim
Sikh
Hindu
Greek Orthodox
Quaker
Seventh Day Adventist United Reformed Church

Well, yes Bertrand - its results are no different to the other local schools, which actually proves my point, not yours. This is a school with a faith based admissions policy that is not oversubscribed and is has 3 or 4 times higher FSM applicants than another faith school that does not have a faith-based admissions criteria and is seriously oversubscribed.
It's not unusual, as shown by other posters.

FSM uptake is far, far lower for Grammar schools. It's lower for free schools.

You are not banned from applying to a faith school.
There are state-funded schools that exclude much more rigorously: academically selective schools, single sex schools.
There are schools whose catchments are carefully managed to exclude the undesirable areas. There are other faith schools that are state-funded, but not Christian. Yet it seems to be the Christian-based faith schools that offend you - many of which are far more inclusive than you're prepared to admit.

I'm not quite sure why everyone keeps going on about FSM, it is completely irrelevant to the Op's question. The ratio of children who receive FSM at each school varies enormously and is dependent on a lot of things, ie where the school is located, if a large proportion of parents who live within that area are unemployed or on low income, if there are a lot of lone parents living near the school. So what if some Faith schools have a low number of children of FSM, so do a lot of community schools, the fact you're even discussing FSM children is completely beyond me.

None so blind.............

Finding very funny that people / supporters of faith school reckon that the issue is resolved by just becoming Catholic.

Says so much about the morals of Christianity....

Actually you will find that a lot of faith schools don't have an official catchment area. My three dc are at a catholic primary and Catholic secondary school and their criteria goes as follows:-

1. Looked after or previously looked after children also children with SeN or medical need
2. Children with a sibling already in attendance at the school
3. Baptised Catholic children resident with the named parishes
4. Baptised Catholic children not resident within the named parishes
5. Children who are of other Christian Faith
6. All other children

Now admittedly the school priorities baptised Catholic children and siblings first after Sen/looked after children however it names 8 parishes locally and not so locally, that are associated with the schools and within these parishes there are affluent neighbourhoods but also some really run down and deprived neighbourhoods, so the school is not hand picking it's students. There are a real mix of children who attend and yes the majority, probably a good three quarters are Catholic but they aren't all from good areas and a lot of them are on FSM yet the school is still oversubscribed every year.

i love the way Christians can defend the indefensible while talking about The importance of their children having Christian values with no apparent sense of irony................

Tanith- the reason we are talking about faith schools is because that is what this thread is about. Happy to join you on another one about other unfair admissions policies.

While I agree that admissions policies for faith schools are often unfair, I'm not sure the tax argument really works. Parents with children at religious schools are taxpayers like anyone else. People who can't drive still pay road tax, childless people pay towards education, pacifists contribute to the defence budget.

Not sure road tax is paid by non drivers, but even if it is, then you probably still uses buses, taxis or trams.

I have no problem paying for the education of other people's children - as a member of society I will benefit as those children become teachers, doctors, bin disposal workers etc.

I, and society get no benefit from a faith based education, in fact it may make things worse.

As a teacher I can be discriminated in my work because of faith or a lack of. And I have to pay towards that discrimination.

There's an entertaining exercise to be had in reading through reports about London Oratory's repeated fights with the Schools Adjudicator about their Byzantine admissions criteria. If anyone thinks there isn't a correlation between the operation of those criteria and their results, they're pretty deluded.