To say religious state schools shouldn’t exist?

[Mushroo]

This is probably controversial but interested in opinions on both sides!

I attended a catholic primary and secondary school and had a lovely education (my parents are actually quite religious). However, given how increasingly secular the UK is it seems quite antiquated and divisive to segregate schools based on religion?

Where I live, our closest primary school as the crow flies is religious (c of e) and as a now atheist we wouldn’t get a place as we sit at the very bottom of the admissions criteria (other religions are given priority over atheist). This means we’d have to walk past it to get to the non-religious school further away.

This leads to many people ‘finding god’ in the nursery years to get a place which I refuse to do.

I don’t see the benefit of religious schools, surely if you are a religious family, you can learn about religion at your place of worship / Sunday school or equivalent.

I think state school should be secular and teach all religions equally (including atheism as an option) and places shouldn’t be offered based on religion. State school places should be based on particular needs (e.g. adopted children, siblings and then distance only).

Genuinely interested in thoughts, AIBU?

I’m a practicing Catholic and I agree that all state schools should be secular. I went to my local non religious comprehensive. The nearest Catholic school was a distance away. I feel more rounded as regards knowledge of religion and atheism. I hope things have changed but some Catholics my age say they did other religions once a term.

I did the specific Catholic learning at church.
I also got challenged about my faith. If your faith can’t live up to questions it’s pointless. We had a Head who followed the idea of broadly Christian worship in school and it just put off my friends.

I agree entirely, and beyond. School should be for education, and people who want religion/faith can do that separately.

I am in favour of religious education, but not worship or indoctrination.

I agree 100% OP

Totally agree OP. Religion has no place in state education.

Agree but my beef is more with using a religion as the main selection criteria and less with having the RE content. I see the latter as part of the parental choice and it’s quite clear that many parents don’t mind some degree of religious leaning especially considering other things church schools can offer (such as the distance).

Of all the “unfair” selection criteria in our school system, I feel that religion has the weakest argument for it. In the real world there are selection based on ability (employers in the job market) or wealth (high end goods and services). But I can’t think of any selection based on religion anymore - would it even be legal?

Not saying other school types are perfect (far from it).

I agree 100%. All schools should be secular. There shouldn't any selective schools at all but there should be streaming and good opportunities for ALL kids at ALL schools

Disagree 😎

Catholic schools opened up their buildings/land to allow the state to provide universal free education for children of all faiths and none, and continue to pay 10% of the capital costs of maintenance (they are funded in exactly the same way as all other state schools)
They constitute approx. 10% of state schools, and have a catchment area approx. 10 times larger than other schools
Intake at these schools is interesting, as the admissions criteria (catholic) results in a significantly diverse cultural and economic mixture, i.e. no selection by postcode!
As a result, children travel to attend these schools, which results in a genuinely representative mixt of children from differing backgrounds
Catholic children comprise roughly 60% of the intake, and if you look at ranking criteria for the allocation of remaining places, looked after children and children with disabilities are actually top of the list.

What we might do if setting up a school system now would almost certainly be different to what we've got, which is down to the history.

Go back to before compulsory education, and everything was privately run. The churches set up and funded schools to educate those who could not afford to pay substantial school fees. Later on, when education was made compulsory, board schools were set up to plug the gaps. In areas where there was good coverage, there was no need for a board school.

The state does not (usually) own the land/buildings of a church school, although nowadays it may contribute to maintenance. Depending on whether the school is voluntary aided or voluntary controlled, the church may also contribute to the running costs.

So it's not a straightforward matter of declaring "from now on, all schools will be secular", and I think the government has other priorities at the moment.

Many church schools serve a diverse population, and do that very well, respecting the variety of beliefs represented in the school.

I don't think state and religion should merge. Imagine Catholic Hospitals or Jewish Libraries....maybe a Muslim swimming pool. Seems quite odd put like that.
I'll actually go one step further and say that lm not convinced religion should be a protected characteristic unless every other lifestyle choice can be.

All the points raised are good - but why should entry be based on whether the child’s parents attend a particular type of church?

Is it not discriminatory to non-Catholics?

For example, you wouldn’t be able to open a school with an admissions criteria that is only open to children whose parents support Manchester City

It’s a straw man example, but Manchester City have funded the regeneration of a lot of North Manchester. Attendance at the new schools isn’t restricted to Manchester City supporters and there would be uproar if it was suggested, as it is obviously a stupid policy.

1. The state should not be funding religious indoctrination. All state schools should be secular.

2. How can you have "a genuinely representative mix of pupils from different backgrounds" if 60% of them are Catholic! :) 60% of the country isn't even Christian!

No, they're not genuinely representative of their populations. Catholic schools, on average, have significantly fewer children who get free school meals, and children with high prior attainment are over-represented.

You don't have to be a catholic to attend a catholic school in Scotland

I agree.

My kids go to C of E primary and secondary - there just isn't a non-religious school within walking distance (which is ridiculous, we literally live in the centre of Liverpool).

We got into our schools no problem, we didn't note the kids as atheist just 'no religion'. But we got our top choices so you may not have an issue (tends to be Catholic schools IME)

@JassyRadlett do you have a source for those claims please? I am curious because it is not my experience of the Catholic schools I know a lot about.

Yadnbu. I can't bear them. The schools nearest is are Catholic and state. The state school is 70%Asian 30% other, the Catholic school has almost no Asians and is about 70% Black, 30% white. It is so sad to see. Should all be mixed. It creates divide.

Do remember that it's not the case that the state owns these schools and is letting them have a religious character
They are church schools, currently operating in conjunction with the state

It seems a moot point when, in the vast majority of cases, the state's been paying for both the buildings and the education for decades

It's true that the actual structures belong to the various churches, but if some sort of buy-out was attempted there'd presumably have to be some financial adjustment to recognise the above - which might not work out in a way those churches would enjoy

I think you'd surprised to find out how much deprivation there is, rather than how much you think there is.

The LSE has done several good reports on this, the most recent in 2020 - I'll dig the papers out on this later; the Campaign for Fair Admissions, the Sutton Trust and NSS have all published reports on this.

Totally agree with this, I think the whole situation would be very hard to unpick.

The entire building of the local school and church was funded by one Victorian philanthropist so it has always been a church school. The church, I presume, own the land and the buildings.

Would you say it had to be a private school now? Or make some kind of compulsory purchase?

You don't have to be a catholic to attend a catholic school in Scotland

When I was growing up in the west of Scotland in the 80s you absolutely had to be Catholic to attend Catholic school. You had to be Catholic to work there.
The sectarianism at that time in that place was awful and keeping kids separate on the basis of religion did not help at all.

I now live in a city and its different there anyway, you might not necessarily go to the same school as your neighbour for all sorts of reasons. But religion shouldn't be a reason.

I get that my experience is more extreme than many on here but all the same religion should not be a factor in admittance to state schools.

I can’t understand why so many people are against independent schools, but are perfectly happy for the state to fund schools which are allowed to have admissions criteria which openly discriminate based on religion. Personally I think religious schools who discriminate based on faith should be funded by the church or by parents. At the moment, a tiny percentage of a faith school’s funding is provided by the church.

Having said that, I don’t blame parents for pretending to be religious for a few years just to get their children to the best performing schools. It’s a ridiculous system.

Id check the admissions criteria as religion tends not to be for Church of England schools! The point of a Church of England schools is to educate all children regardless of education in the way that Jesus welcomed every one., i teach in a church school and nowhere is religion mentioned in our admissions criteria.

Agree 100 % we should be the same as France . France are a good example in many things .

I posted it up thread - it’s faith based priority with ‘no religion’ coming in last.

There is a CofE school near us which specifies in its admissions criteria that the bulk of places is given to worshipping CofE applicant.