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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To refuse even to consider applying for a place in the local faith school for DS

114 replies

madamez · 24/05/2008 19:08

Yes, some of his friends from playgroup and nursery are going to go there. Yes, it's within walking distance of where we live. Yes, apparently it's a nice school with an inclusive admissions policy and a good reputation.
But it's a faith school and I do not approve of faith schools and I don't want DS to be force-fed crap or to feel separate from other children on the grounds of other people's superstitious bullshit. There are plenty of other schools, so why are people saying I should send him to this one?

OP posts:
WilfSell · 24/05/2008 19:10

perhaps because sending your kid to a faith school is a sure fire way to turn him into an atheist?!

foxinsocks · 24/05/2008 19:10

Don't. We didn't either.

Some people don't mind the force feeding and can overlook the faith issue and some people are religious and want that sort of education I guess.

muggglewump · 24/05/2008 19:11

YANBU.
I'd never send DD to a faith school

constancereader · 24/05/2008 19:11

YANBU
It is totally your decision, why would anyone else offer their opinion?

VacantlyPretty · 24/05/2008 19:11

Message withdrawn

Tortington · 24/05/2008 19:11

you don't care what other people say though do you?

Uriel · 24/05/2008 19:13

Surely the problem for you will be having to send him to school with the children of mundanes?

avenanap · 24/05/2008 19:13

Good for you. My ds's school used to be free from this stuff (no RE at all) until they had a new head. Now RE consists of nothing but God and jesus . I hate it. Ds told him we were of the Jedi faith. That went down well . He's your child, send him where you want.

sherby · 24/05/2008 19:13

YANBU, DD will be going to another school further away than our nearest which is a faith school that actively partakes in local churchy stuff. I can't stand the 'it doesn't do them any harm crap'

princessesmomma · 24/05/2008 19:13

You have to do whatever it takes to provide the very best for your offspring. If you do not then you are failing your children. Which is more important, your morals or your children?

Original poster
madamez · 24/05/2008 19:16

Princessmomma, I don't understand your post at all. There are not guarantees that this school is the 'best; or even as good as other schools. It's a myth that faith schools are 'better; anyway. I am just getting nagged by my mother. Who is not listening when I remind her that the church school she sent me to was so shit that nearly all the children needed extra coaching to be able to read and write.

OP posts:
WilfSell · 24/05/2008 19:31

I'm an utter, absolute, complete atheist. And my kids go to a CofE school. But where we live makes it a very liberal and reasonably multicultural intake. they do a fair bit of bible bashing, but it is moderated by a fair bit of 'other faith' stuff which they use parents to help with.

And it is a very good school.

But if I had a choice of other good schools within walking distance with existing friends going, I probably wouldn't put then in there...

I still think by about 8-9, they develop quite a good critical response to religious stuff - it goes with rejecting Father Xmas, magic and all that hocus pocus too. My 9 year old scoffs at all the gobbledigook, though he sometimes would like to go to the family services (DH and I shriek 'no farkin way'...)

HonoriaGlossop · 24/05/2008 19:48

I went to a C of E school and ALL my family are, as wilf says, utter, absolute and complete atheists. It was just the best school locally for us, as the others in our catchment were single sex and my parents didn't want us to have single sex education

In all ways it was just an ordinary comprehensive school education. And in many ways actually I think it helped me decide on my own views on religion; we had church services, etc, so I had the chance to experience them and find out what I thought, which I wouldn't have got otherwise as we didn't go to church as a family, obviously

so for me there's nothing to be scared of; they didn't 'feed us crap' or expect us to believe and it was a useful way for me to actually experience religion/church and form my own ideas.

foofi · 24/05/2008 19:50

Your child wouldn't be "force-fed crap" or "superstitious bullshit". He would learn to read and write and have good moral values. YABU

WilfSell · 24/05/2008 19:54

Oh no, he will be force fed crap (ickle baby jesus) and to start with he will have limited monocultural morals. but he'll learn independent thinking and argument from you and he'll cope admirably...

gegs73 · 24/05/2008 19:57

YANBU as it is your child and your choice.
However if I were you, it was your nearest school, reasonable and lots of friends were going I would consider it.

If your lack of faith is as strong as it sounds, I really don't think anything they are told at school will make them question this. I think they have to cover all faiths by law anyway not just CoE.

wessexgirl · 24/05/2008 19:59

Madamez, you might be interested to hear about my friend's current appeal.

The schools in our town are almost all denominational, and she put the only non-denom in her area first - failed to get in because it's very popular with a good reputation.

The only place she was offered for her ds was at the local CofE school. She appealed on the basis that she had an equal right to put her child in a non-faith school as religious folk do to put their child in a voluntary aided or controlled one.

The LEA have told her they don't have sufficient expertise in the matter to rule on this, but it is going forward to the Ombudsman and apparently there may be grounds under Human Rights legislature to back her up.

I'll let you know the outcome if you're interested - though she's gorn and buggered off to Spain for a month, so won't hear anything for a few weeks yet.

CombustibleLemon · 24/05/2008 20:02

I always positively liked that we have state funded faith schools. Then I saw the Dispatches programme on Christian Fundamentalists, that showed a state school teaching creationism as science. Apparently the curriculum they teach is also used by other state faith schools in England. I was stunned. YANBU.

Original poster
madamez · 24/05/2008 20:23

I don't exactly think that it would do DS harm as such to go there (I will be able to put any bullshit he gets told in context as mythology and prejudice, I have no doubts about that): I just don;t want him to go because I think it's wrong that superstition has any place in state schools and that schools are allowed to peddle one brand of it over others.

OP posts:
Rachmumoftwo · 24/05/2008 20:31

Better to stick to what you believe than feel like a hypocrite. I'm sure you can find another school for your child. I don't think a child should be sent to a school which will conflict their home values too strongly, they may end up confused, torn and unhappy.

Elasticwoman · 24/05/2008 20:50

Madamez - if you feel strongly against faith schools, which is quite justifiable, you cannot fail to communicate that feeling to your child over the 6 or 7 years he would spend there, and create confusion and anxiety in his mind. Therefore I think your mother is wrong and you are right in this matter.

My dc went to a C of E school before we moved, and then to a village state school, without there being very much discernible difference in ethos. The non-faith school got better SATS results, but that's because it's in a wealthier area than the other school. I'm sure my dc would have done pretty much the same in either school.

ruddynorah · 24/05/2008 20:56

i'm a bit of the same feeling HOWEVER, dd will go to the c of e school near us as it is literaly across the road from our house and is a very very good school. for me those 2 things outweigh the fact it is c of e.

i feel that dd will have enough other influences OTHER than school to ensure she has a broad, open minded, up bringing.

i was brought up catholic, with catholic grandparents. i went to a catholic primary school, a non-denom high school (which was largely cof e in reality ie the vicar coming in for assembly etc). my dad is muslim (to further confuse matters). and now i've married dh who is from a c of e family. ANYWAY, neither of us go to churh or any such thing. i think dd will be fine at this school.

GrimmaTheNome · 24/05/2008 21:10

YANBU.

I simply couldn't contemptate (a) having to attend church to get DD into our village CofE school and (b)implicitly supporting the system. I disapprove on principle. Religious discrimination isn't allowed in the workplace, how on earth does it come to be seen as desirable in schools?

snickersnack · 24/05/2008 21:14

YANBU. Our nearest school is great, but Catholic. Am amazed how many of our neighbours find God when their children get to 2 or 3...they do (apparently) take a small quota of non-Catholic children and we're so close I think we'd probably get in but I don't want my children educated in a faith-based environment so think we'll have to throw ourselves on the mercy of the next-nearest-but-not-nearly-as-good school.

spanky81 · 24/05/2008 21:16

I think that there is an awful amount of worry about being brainwashed going on.
It simply doesn't happen, esp if you are not from a religiuos family.
If you like the school and think it will provide him with a good education, then go for it.
If not, I don't understand why you are so bothered