To think faith schools are great and it’s only the admission cheats that make them unfair?

[Wondermule]

My second controversial post in a few days. I don’t need a hard hat at this point, I need a bunker and full ghillie suit. But here goes.

Inspired by a thread, where a poster happily shared that they lied about going to church to get their kids into a Catholic school, before denouncing the admission system as deeply unfair...

I would like to put to the good people of mumsnet that actually, admission by religion is a really good idea. And it is only the people that cheat the admission system that keep it unfair for others.

Religion is a great criteria for school admissions. It doesn’t indicate intelligence; it isn’t an indicator of wealth; it would keep sibling groups together; and the ethos and PSHE would be generally in keeping with the parents’ beliefs.

The reason why faith schools are ‘better’ are because of non-religious people with intelligent kids cheating the system to get their kids a place. This then perpetuates the cycle - the kids perform well, the school becomes more desirable, so more people cheat to get their kids in.

So aside from depriving genuine applicants of school places, they are contributing to a system that they denounce as unfair. Whereas if they stopped playing the system, schools would actually be more mixed in terms of demographics, more equal, and there wouldn’t a stampede for just a few of them.

Phew! Thoughts please?!

@B33Fr33

Faith schools are a waste of funding! Students do well in them because the students who get in are from.families who value education highly (but don't understand it). Those students would, most likely, perform well in any school. The faith schools thus are not providing any 'added value' and are possibly lower performing than other schools. BUT because they get good results they get good students and more money to send the way of the church etc. I am against faith schools as well because I want my children to learn in a rational non judgemental environment. I've read through a lot of the "values" of faith schools and they are alarming. It's a cunning means by the church in particular to inflate co generations, donations and secure government money by not doing anything. Religions are just like any other money making scam. They offer something they can't actually provide.

But we’re not discussing the merits of faith schools are we? We’re discussing using faith as a random admission marker.

@B33Fr33
That is a huge generalisation and with direct experience I can say that some do certainly add value.
There is quite a lot of what comes across as bigotry in your post. Maybe live your life and let others lead theirs.

[quote Blackberrycream]@B33Fr33
That is a huge generalisation and with direct experience I can say that some do certainly add value.
There is quite a lot of what comes across as bigotry in your post. Maybe live your life and let others lead theirs.[/quote]
Well yes but if everyone actually did that, we wouldn’t have any threads would we?!

There is some irony in wanting a non judgmental environment for your children written from a perspective of judgement of huge swathes of the population.

Because people would just send their kids to the nearest school, the posh areas would excel, then the postcode cheating would start.

There have been interesting experiments in other countries with allotting school places by lottery within a given area to stop wealthy parents buying up houses in desirable catchments.

@Blackberrycream

There is some irony in wanting a non judgmental environment for your children written from a perspective of judgement of huge swathes of the population.

I agree, but i can also see @B33Fr33 point - contrary to 99% of the posts on this thread, I’m not saying heavy religious teaching in schools is a good thing, it was purely ‘is religion a fairer way of dealing with admissions, when people aren’t cheating the system of course’.

I do understand why people think religion in school is a bad idea but that’s not actually to do with my question.

@Wondermule
I understand that the thread was not about that but I didn’t want to let the point above go unaddressed. I also understand why some don’t want religion in a school. What I don’t see though is the arrogance of then imposing that viewpoint on others.

@KeflavikAirport

Because people would just send their kids to the nearest school, the posh areas would excel, then the postcode cheating would start.

There have been interesting experiments in other countries with allotting school places by lottery within a given area to stop wealthy parents buying up houses in desirable catchments.

Yes, a previous poster on here suggested school places being allocated by SATS results (or similar), by making it a three band system and admitting an equal number of lower achievers/average/high achievers. I thought it was brilliant.

I would add that France is currently targeting vast additional funding at the first two years of primary in education priority areas, capping class sizes at 12 for millions of children. That is an extremely effective measure in combating inequality.

The lottery system though does require more children to travel to school, rather than just walk. You could easily add an hour on to childrens days to make them go to a school further away when there's a school walking distance from their house.

Everyone attending their local school is better for the environment.

Yes the lottery system only really works in large urban areas with decent public transport. Actually the experiment I was thinking of was where the catchments swapped over year on year between rich and less wealthy areas.

@Zevia
That simply isnt true with regards to wealth. The economic equality in the UK, between people of different faiths, is stark.

www.brin.ac.uk/economic-inequality-and-religion/

Well, the main difference between people of different faiths in terms of income seems to be that Muslims are disadvantaged, not that Christians are advantaged.

Christians en masse do seem to have more accumulated wealth, but that may be because of age difference rather than faith.

DD goes to a Catholic school (we're Anglican) and there is a high proportion of children who are first or second generation immigrants, and is very racially diverse - one of the things we wanted as we have just returned from living overseas and DD is black. For us racial and linguistic diversity and international family links are more important than religious diversity at this point.

I disagree with faith schools more than independent. Generally, they provide superior education funded by taxpayers so it is my view that they should be open to all (irrespective of religion). In this respect, independent sector is at least not pretentious.

The best schools would be in posh areas, then postcode cheating would begin.

What do you mean by best schools? They wouldn't be better funded, because they would get less PP money etc and why would the teaching be better, just because the children came from nicer homes/wealthier families?
If you are talking results, then yes children coming from a 'posher' background are more likely to have well-educated, supportive parents themselves, so are more likely to have positive outcomes. This doesn't make the school better; they just have arguably an easier job.

I read another thread where a child was baptized in Portugal and attended regularly but that it wouldn't be recognized at their local faith school in England which sounds outrageous to me. (I'm an atheist with kids at non-religious schools) If it's because foreign baptism certificates are easily forged or can't be checked then I'd say that was an unfair hurdle for a genuine family.

@MargosKaftan

The lottery system though does require more children to travel to school, rather than just walk. You could easily add an hour on to childrens days to make them go to a school further away when there's a school walking distance from their house.

Everyone attending their local school is better for the environment.

The OP doesn't want everyone going to their local school, because she thinks the schools in 'posh' areas will be better.

Another reason faith schools do well is they have additional income streams than just state funding per child and fund raising from the parents, the churches in our area give large sums regularly to the local faith schools, both for every day funding, and particular projects.

@DietrichandDiMaggio

Well they would be wouldn’t they? Horrific for social mobility and encouraging postcode cheating?

I fundamentally disagree with discriminating against children on the grounds of their parents' religion. It isn't something they can change at an early age, and they can't say they are Catholic if their parents aren't. So effectively they are being discriminated against for something they cannot change.

State funded faith schools should not exist, or at least if they do, they should take their pupils from the local area on a fair allocation (at least 50%) , rather than saying you have to have gone to church every Sunday since you were 3 months old.

DS's secondary school is 800m from our house (less as the crow flies). I would have been very angry if he had been denied a place because we weren't Catholic or whatever. Fortunately it is an all comers comprehensive.

Religion is a random criteria that doesn’t denote intelligence or wealth how is it random?

@poppycat10

I fundamentally disagree with discriminating against children on the grounds of their parents' religion. It isn't something they can change at an early age, and they can't say they are Catholic if their parents aren't. So effectively they are being discriminated against for something they cannot change.

State funded faith schools should not exist, or at least if they do, they should take their pupils from the local area on a fair allocation (at least 50%) , rather than saying you have to have gone to church every Sunday since you were 3 months old.

DS's secondary school is 800m from our house (less as the crow flies). I would have been very angry if he had been denied a place because we weren't Catholic or whatever. Fortunately it is an all comers comprehensive.

Religion is a random criteria that doesn’t denote intelligence or wealth how is it random?

But discriminating against them on the basis of where their parents can afford to live is fine?

I think they are horrible and should be abolished or at least not funded by the government. Children should have the opportunity for a secular education free from the religion imposed by their parents.

@MixedUpFiles

I think they are horrible and should be abolished or at least not funded by the government. Children should have the opportunity for a secular education free from the religion imposed by their parents.

But that isn’t the topic being discussed is it?

How many more times?

The reason why faith schools are ‘better’ are because of non-religious people with intelligent kids cheating the system to get their kids a place

I don't follow this. Are you suggesting non-religious people have kids who are more intelligent than religious ones? This doesn't make sense

Your reasoning would also suggest that religious schools are awash with kids who have cheated the system and are non-religious - I'm not sure you have your proportions right

Cheating the system should be investigated and acted upon IMO

@turquoisewaters

The reason why faith schools are ‘better’ are because of non-religious people with intelligent kids cheating the system to get their kids a place

I don't follow this. Are you suggesting non-religious people have kids who are more intelligent than religious ones? This doesn't make sense

Your reasoning would also suggest that religious schools are awash with kids who have cheated the system and are non-religious - I'm not sure you have your proportions right

Cheating the system should be investigated and acted upon IMO

No.

What I’m saying is

1. Religion is zero indication of intelligence.
2. However, parents hellbent on certain schools are more likely to be middle class and more ambitious for their offspring - so offspring more likely to perform better
3. So if you have a school of 100 random Catholics, you would get a mix of intelligences. A school of 50 Catholics and 50 kids of pushy parents more likely to tutor and encourage them, not so much.

I'm in favour of parental beliefs being diluted rather than reinforced

Why? I would want school to support me in what I teach my children, not become an enemy and work against me