To think secular groups should be allowed to object to faith school admissions?

[RockUnit]

The education secretary, Nicky Morgan, wants to ban organisations from objecting to faith school admission procedures, to “stop vexatious complaints against faith schools by secularist campaign groups”.

link here

According to the article linked to above, the government will carry out a public consultation on the proposed changes.

There should be a ban on faith schools, France is way ahead of us .

as long as it is tax payer funded, then they can complain

Stopping vexatious complaints is fine.

IIRC, some were because of things like saying 'X places' rather than 'up to X places' (something which my LEA also got wrong). And there had been little/no attempt to ask the admission authority to correct these.

It just detracts from dealing with actual abuses by any/all admissions authorities. I suspect there are many cans of worms in Free Schools.

Why Eau?

IloveAntbuthateDec

because do you think that governments should be spending money on discriminatory, divisive schools? Teaching religious superstition as fact in science, geography classes etc is a good idea?

if you want your child to be indoctrinated in to a religion, send them to mosque, temple etc at your own cost

Academies are a bigger issue.

If you ban all groups from raising a complaint then it will just be down to individuals to make their own case. Some complaints by organisations may be "vexatious" or timewasting, but why should reasonable groups be banned from making a good argument on people's behalf? It's much harder for one person to challenge the system by themselves.

Free schools and academies are a different issue and of course do have their own problems.

Teaching religious superstition as fact in science, geography classes etc is a good idea?

My two went to a catholic school and there was none of this at all

Vexatious complaints aren't a 'good argument'

Well, every time I've come across them, they've been counterproductive

And if the aim is to ensure admissions authorities comply with the Admissions Code (which I agree is a laudable aim) I'd much rather see a proper survey of all schools. Not a partial one then used to promote an agenda.

Vexatious complaints aren't a 'good argument'

Just to clarify, I wasn't saying they were. I was saying that reasonable groups will be banned as well as groups that make "vexatious complaints".

They should be allowed to object so long as their objection is reasonable. Although I don't count being disrespectful of someone else's faith reasonable particularly if said parent has chosen religious school.

The problem is that campaign groups will take action on principal which takes up time and money.

OK, so perhaps IABU!

However - are there any groups that aren't about promoting secularism, but are campaigning against unfair faith school admissions? I have a faith but disagree with priority for those who attend a place of worship, as it's so open to misuse and "prayers for places".

If there was such a group campaigning sensibly I'd be interested in joining it and don't think Nicky Morgan should stop them coming forward with good points.

Why don't they ban vexatious complaints instead?

fair admissions campaign & others should be allowed to continue their good work. it is too complicated for local people to know all the rules and be able to get the complaints right.

better still if admissions were more harmonised (not a different policy for every school) and were not faith-based.

Whilst I totally understand where you're coming from and actually fully support the right to object getting rid of faith based schools would be expensive. This is because the land the schools are on is often owned by the diocese or the community that built it. That is certainly the case with my DDs school where the land was bought and the school built via subscription and donations. If governments over the last century had invested properly in our school system rather than going for the cheap option it would be easier to have a totally secular system. Let's object - but about the lack of investment, the poor pay and conditions for teachers, the paperwork, the red tape and the fact that governments of any colour won't put the money in.

Many faith schools are not public funded. Many faith schools are partial publicly funded.

In the majority of case these schools fill a quota (percentage wise) of non faith pupils.

I think that unless you live locally and might want to send your child to a school then the admissions code of st blog's school 50 miles away is none of your business.

I object to campaign groups interfering with what should be local politics. For example the English defence league bussed in a load of thugs to protest against a mosque being built in my town. Should people outside the area be allowed to oppose planning permission for the mosque? Would it be deemed daft to oppose planning permission for a mosque in a town you have never been to?

Similarly only local people should be allowed to protest about the admissions code of a school.

Under Nicky Morgan's new rule, would a local group of people still be able to complain about unfair admission criteria? Or not, because they're a group?

If one parent complains by themselves, if the school knows who they are won't this upset their future relationship with the school?

Referring to an effort to reduce privilege on the grounds of race, religion, gender etc as "vexatious" is extremely unfortunate.

"Under Nicky Morgan's new rule, would a local group of people still be able to complain about unfair admission criteria? Or not, because they're a group?"

I think a lot depends on the address of the members of the group. If members of the national secular society live near a faith school then they are directly affected by the admissions criteria. I can't see how Nicky can stop the national secular society encouraging local residents to complain about school admissions.

I don't think you can classify school admissions as a 'local issue' really, not when education is paid for out of general taxation, and we have national rules about what schools can and can't do.

Like, say, if a hospital was only doing operations on the healthiest candidates to massage its death rates; that would be more than a local issue, don't you think? Or the Stafford Hospital - also more than a local issue.

school which exclude children on the basis of religion should only be able to exclude the equivalent of money that is self funded. If they want to fully exclude then they should not be able to access public funds and should fund the school themselves.

"I don't think you can classify school admissions as a 'local issue' really, not when education is paid for out of general taxation, and we have national rules about what schools can and can't do."

Schools have to discriminate somehow if they are over subscribed. Some schools discriminate on sex, distance, others have a catchment and some use religion. If you live 50 miles away then you are unlikely to send your child to the school in question so the issue of admissions policies has no affect on you personally.