Why do faith schools dominate the league tables?

[benetint]

I looked at the league tables for primary schools in my area (nottingham) and I was surprised to see the top few were not schools in affluent areas bur were all catholic schools. Many of them are actually in quite deprived areas. So what is it catholic schools are doing to get such excellent results? Is it that they can be more selective about who they take? Are they just exam factories? Ate they stricter with their kids? Or are they just better in general than secular states?

You would be surprised, there are several children with special needs both at mass and in school.

As for those from other countries they do get places (usually to the annoyance of local families who are non-practising.)

But 'we'll take any child as long as their parents are prepared to get them to church every Sunday and ensure they prepare for communion' is never going to cover the full social range.

Wouldn't it be more Christian to try to help disadvantaged people of all faiths or none?

But 'we'll take any child as long as their parents are prepared to get them to church every Sunday and ensure they prepare for communion' is never going to cover the full social range.

I don't know about social range, but the 2011 league tables certainly show that they don't end up with a representative ability range. We are really talking about oversubscribed faith schools though. Other, less popular schools will take anyone who wishes to go to them. And in some areas, Catholic schools, however popular, ask for nothing more than a baptism certificate.

I think it varies geographically, and in each area will have its own explanation. In my area, there are five state primaries: one Catholic, two CoE, two community schools. All are almost neck and neck in the results they achieve, but the community schools are slightly ahead.

@indigo My DC's catholic primary has one of the biggest (if not the biggest) percentage of EAL children in the area. Among my DCs friends are children whose parents were born in Poland, Germany, Slovenia, Slovakia, France, Goa, Nigeria, Spain, Czech republic, Netherlands, Belgium. Kids with SN are, IME as a parent (not so much as a child, admittedly) very very welcome in catholic churches. These days, younger kids get to go off to childrens' liturgies for a big proportion of mass, so they don't have to sit quiet for an hour. Sitting quiet isn't much of a feature at any point in the family masses I have been attending since I first started having children. In our parish we currently have 3 regular attendees with more than mild AS issues, and several more with mild AS (including DS).

It's probably also worth reminding people that while in many areas catholic schools are at the top of the performance tables, in many areas (sometimes the very same areas, sometimes not) they are also right at the bottom, particularly in deprived or inner city areas. This is mainly because they do not in fact select on anything other than religious committment.

@merrymouse that is just not true. How on earth do you think Catholicism has survived in this country if it didn't thrive in the heartlands of the immigrant communities? There are very few posh Catholics.

Agree with Meta - I think we may have gone to the same secondary school! There is a lot of RC bashing and not sure why? If a family want to practice their faith within the church and extend that to their dcs school, what is wrong with that?

@angel we did! :) Even in those far off days, in my year there were girls whose first language was Polish (of course), Italian, Spanish, Urdu, French....and that was just in my friendship group. Happy days.

Meta - just checked some previous threads and we also went to the same primary - I think I am a year older than you! Have joined mumnet recently - can get a lot of useful info but find a lot of controversy with faith schools.

god favours us over heathens

@Angel well if you went to RC then I must know you! Or used to have known you. How bizarre!

because they can say that god will punish them and send them to hell if they don't know what 30x5 is etc

@germy yes that is exactly what they told me at school.

faith schools are selective, they can pick and choose who they let in

@germy this is true however their basis for selection is comsiderably less exclusive than most catchment area schools, which select on grounds of depth of pockets.

Metabilis3 Which bit of my comment isn't true?

Parents who really can't cope with their children don't tend to get them to church on a Sunday morning (or any other religious building on any day of the week).

I am not singling out Catholic schools.

Our eldest attends rc primary.

its the nearest faith school to our house.
we liked it for its ethos and its size just 45intake.
The headmaster very strict, its disiplined, they do a lot for chairity and sounds a cliche its a community yes there,s a mix of different backgrounds seems much more diverse than the posh school or community primary nearby as people from different economic backgrounds, polish, even few muslims and sikks-not a huge proportion of ethnic but a representation.

It does draw from a very wide area. This i feels good thing as a small catchment in leafy suberb guarantees a affluent family go there.

Academically its its the middle of my nearest schools.

The 2 nearest coe- very small catchments affluent areas-do better in sats.

The 2nearest community primaries do worse

The 2posh academic state schools do slightly better.

we are coe-well I am not rc.
we had to give in baptism certificate
The year we applied was unusually under subscribed.
I would say only small proportion of eldests year are rc.
its only if oversubscribed that there is an admission criteria.

looked after/kids in care at the top
baptised catholics within parish I think is higher priority than siblings.Im hoping my other 2 get in, never heard of siblings being split yet at our school.

we dont go church often mainly due to younger 2. only at xmas did toddler steal baby jesus out of crib during church nativity and ran off with doll whilst hubby tried to prise off her i placed our baby in crib as dident know what to do was so embaressing

If we attend mass we nor ally sit on the balcony.
the sunday schools for older kids.

I do think catchment plays a part.

can think of 2rc primaries in more urban areas that are lot more diverse and deprived areas i imagine they may be better than the community primaries within that area but maybe not as good results as leafy suberbs.

At secondry the 3 best performing state schools are state and much more selective and have city wide catchment area.

The rc secondry in not so nice area but hardly any kids from that area go there, people travel lots of miles to get there as its in the best.I dont think we stand a chance as we not baptised rc and even rc parents appeal.

Also what blurs us is theres 2 rc secondries and our primary suppost to feed into the other one which is not so good.have no idea why again its in deprived area and think possibly draws more from its own area as opposed to the over one as its not until its oversubscribed that admission criteria gets much more selective.

Important to note that the city itself is 1lea surrounded by 2other las. teh surrounding la dont have any faith schools so all the faith kids within that la have to travel within the city la boudry to get a faith based secondry education.

From what I have seen here and where I grew up the proportion of faith secondries are still minority theres really not that many and most kids travel a distance to get to one.

The coe school-you dont just need baptism certificate.
you need evidence of 3solid years week in week our church attendance in order to go.

The cathderal school was independant turned state academy-yes its faith but also has entrance tests and musical aptitude.
Again highly sought after.

I do think in majority faith schools do better if they oversubscribed and geography plays a part for sure.

Parents prefer to travel less distance at primary than they would at secondry

Lots non faith parents choose faith school as its

best results
small
struct
nearest to their house so viable option on application.

maybe its the case in cities where choices of school are greater than a rural area although mum lives rural small town and rc primary the best there.

@merrymouse the bit that isn't true was the suggestion that being a catholic doesn't extend 'across the social scale'. And FYI being poor and working class does not automatically mean you can't cope wth your children Not being able to cope with your children is another of those things, like having a religion, that can and does extend across the social scale. however in the case of being specifically catholic the skew is towards the working class end not the posh end. It's the other way round with CofE.

Being poor and working class does not mean that you can't cope with your children. But living a chaotic lifestyle often does mean that. And being poor and living a chaotic lifestyle are the main indicators of academic underachievement. And these children are by definition most likely to go to the nearest school regardless of faith.

Seeker, what's the juggling theory?

We are a working class household, we pay rent, we don't have a car and we don't go on holidays abroad. I have a range of different friends in my community from different backgrounds and social status. To name few there are: the fake Christian ones who used to go to the church just to get child in there. the real Christian ones who went to the church all their lives. the well off ones that can afford to live near the oversubscribed primary surrounded by big houses with gardens and professional parents with big cars. other working class ones who live near the primary foundation which is outstanding. _unemployeds and singles parents living in council blocks (like me) who send their children to the 'rough primary' where my dd goes. The school has a bad reputation just because of the look of the parents at the gates (also high proportion of muslins and women wearing hijab) nobody bother reading the ofsted report which is 'good' and nobody bothers getting to know the school which has the best facilities of them all. It drives me crazy when people start to criticise the school just from what they see at the gates. My dd attended the 'outstanding' one for nursery and we both didn't like it. I'm glad she is where she is now we absolutely love it. As for coping with their children, only my family and the real catholic friends who are poorer than us cope well with our children. The other friends I mentioned above are always stresses, complaining and moaning about children and life in general. Sadly having their child in the 'right' school didn't make it better because the problem is not the school but their attitude.

Wouldn't it be more Christian to try to help disadvantaged people of all faiths or none?

The purpose of many RC schools (have a look at mission statements) is to promote RC life.

The unwritten ethos is to keep the RC children away from non RC children and hope when they get old enough they will marry each other and have many little RC children.

I have just gone through the primary application process with my DS. He is going to a Catholic school. We have a very high Polish Catholic immigrant community, which has meant that the school has had to expand to accommodate it. They are not wealthy. I'm not saying the schools aren't effectively selective, because they are, but it's not on class or money grounds. It is selective on the grounds of parental commitment to the school and to their children. Incidentally, it was also the only school I visited that put an emphasis on discipline and academic achievement. It's quite an old fashioned school.
Incidentally, there are many excellent state schools in our area, none of which my son would have got into because of the shortage of school places. All the schools I listed were less than 0.5 miles away. Sometimes you have to do what you have to do.

I think you have to look at the schools' ethos.

If you look at the countrywide FSM and diversity stats, you find that CofE schools are pretty much average. They make up around 25% of schools. They have slightly lower FSM overall, but the proportion with over 30% FSM is slightly higher than nationwide. Diversity stats are typical.

RC school have typical numbers on FSM, but a more diverse population than typical. Interestingly, despite a typical population, RC schools have a much lower rate of exclusions than typical.

I'm afraid I don't know about schools of other faiths.

But there is not clear cut picture that indicates "selectivity" on a national basis. That is why I think you need to look at (for these religions) what Christianity brings to the ethos of a school that benefits it so much.

My son attends our local RC school and I'm a governor there, the school is fantastic and has the best results in the town and well above average results compared to the country as a whole. Why is this? Well it's not due to great facilities as its a Victorian space limited school, the parents are from all walks of life but mainly average working class origins, and the teachers are well just teachers. The main reason we do so well is down to the simple fact that the whole school is a community, it can only take a maximum of 210 pupils and every teacher knows every single child and most of the parents as well.

The religious aspect is obviously important and all all children are taught above love and respect and the usual Christian values obviously with a RC slant.

As for being selective with new pupils this is not true all RC schools give priority to Catholics (practicing or not) not any parent can request a place and many other faiths especially Christians do. At present around 25% of the pupils come from non catholic background many of them are from non religious families.

As for discipline and standards we pride ourselves on having well behaved children and this is needed as the school is very space limited and all children from reception to yr 6 respect the rules and abide by them.