Cant get DC into a faith school

[angelfireabbey]

I know this is possibly the wrong place because it seems the whole of MN is atheist or totally secular. However, there is a lot of discussion by MNers here about getting intofaith schools ( often without any faith because they are good schools).

I am a little bit fed up with it. I take my faith seriously. I take my DC to church and we believe. I wanted my DC to have a faith education. There are only two faith schools where I live. They are oversubscribed by parents who seem to have suddenly aquired a need to attend church to get a vicars signiture.

I had my pastors signiture but we didnt get a place. So instead my DC is stuck in a state school where the teachers and other children laugh and say that they have " imaginary friends" ( or simply they are nutters!) and that they believe in fairly stories etc. Sound familiar MN parents? ( I bet you wouldnt say it if someone were of say Jewish or Muslim faith though would you?). It is offensive you know.

They have an atheist teacher who clearly knows next to nothing about Christianity.

I would settle for any faith school although there are no others ( of any faith ) within 40 miles of us.

So how do I get into one? I have asked my church community. I know they are doing their best and we are praying hard but I am sure some savvy non religious types must know more here. So I am asking.
I see thread on thread where parents are scamming the system.So how does a genuine person get in?

Thanks.

Sorry! Hit post.

Nelson mandela

What worries me so is that so many people just accept what they are told by media, politics or school, and do not look beyond to see if another persons view might just be valid.

So if you are so keen for people to hear all sides, why did you choose to tell your DCs not to share "another person's view" with their classmates?

I am not saying it is. But that I find it interesting because historical interpretations is very much part of the National Curriculum and most people in life have grey areas to their past. How these are interpreted are very much a reflection of society.

You Grandad's as well as the school's

It was not Nelson Mandela but it could just as well have been. Similarly it could have been Ghandi. We have likewise changed history to elevate Mary Seacole above Florance Nightingale. Historians are still arguing about it but in school that is not the case. Such are the poilitical agendas worked out.

I am completely lost now. I presume you're talking about Nelson Mandela? Everybody knows that the battle against apartheid was very nasty indeed, and Mandela among others, would have been classed as terrorists when young. That is one of the reasons why his life is so interesting, and so useful for kids to study.

So if you are so keen for people to hear all sides, why did you choose to tell your DCs not to share "another person's view" with their classmates?

I am not stupid. Do you really think I want my DC to be subjected to the kind of comments I have faced here? Better for me to remove them from school which is what I did.

Still confused about why you chose to tell your DCs not to share the alternative view you're so keen for everyone to know about.

We have likewise changed history to elevate Mary Seacole above Florance Nightingale.
her name was Florence
and please link to where in the curriculum such a thing has been done?
as you are starting to sound reactionary rather than measured

I am completely lost now. I presume you're talking about Nelson Mandela

No, you presumed completely wrongly. But the point is wellmade. You do know there is an alternative view of such people?

"So if you are so keen for people to hear all sides, why did you choose to tell your DCs not to share "another person's view" with their classmates?

I am not stupid. Do you really think I want my DC to be subjected to the kind of comments I have faced here? Better for me to remove them from school which is what I did."

But why? Mandela's early life was discussed at both my children's schools, and the transition from terrorist to freedom fighter was a particular focus......

Do you really think I want my DC to be subjected to the kind of comments I have faced here? Better for me to remove them from school which is what I did.

The comments are in response to your posts.

Are you now saying you are not prepared to stand up for what you believe in, just in case someone disagrees with you, and you're encouraging your DCs to do the same?

wuzzup this whole debate is about the existence of schools, state and independent that focus on teaching one system of beliefs, OP was considering a private brethren school. The point I was making is that I am certainly not aware of any indies which are generally highly regarded that would offer narrow teaching in RE. This for instance is what is taught in the, inclusive of course, most highly regarded local RC indie

"Students in the First and Second Years follow courses that provide the essential background to GCSE Religious Studies. They are also introduced to the study of two major World religions: Buddhism and Islam.

In the Third and Fourth Year students follow the AQA GCSE Religious Studies Specification – Ethics and St Mark’s Gospel. All students take the examination at the end of the Fourth Year and results to date have been excellent. The course of study for the Fifth Year is an introduction to AS Philosophy of Religion and Ethics (non-examined).

In the Lower Sixth, students can take Religious Studies at AS and A2. Those Lower Sixth students who do not take this option follow a non-examined, modular enrichment programme designed to deepen their understanding of spirituality and the impact of religion on the wider world."

Which was my point, that all students, state and private, faith or non faith, should be equipped with this understanding of other faiths.

Obviously you have found a "top" indie that does not

Similarly Hakluyt, the white poppy movement - the peace movement between the wars. There is a school of thought that suggests that had the peacemovement got their way peace at all costs, we could well all be venerating some SS officers now.

Not many people read John Stuart Mill I suspect but he once said "War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things; the decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks nothing is worth a war, is worse."

And for the record,I do believe that it is disrespectful to all those who have fought and died in conflicts to have the white poppy paraded at remembrance time.

Are you now saying you are not prepared to stand up for what you believe in, just in case someone disagrees with you, and you're encouraging your DCs to do the same?

I am perfectly prepared to stand upfor what I believe. I am not prepared for my DC to have to do so. I am equally though prepared to ensure they are protected too.

wuzup I totally understand what you are saying about how history and how things can be seen from differing perspectives. Often you feel that opinion is taught as fact in some areas of state education.

I think it was good for your dad to raise these points with your ds.

And you show a woeful ignorance of pre Govian History teaching in schools which as with the academic study of History in Universities had moved away from the view of History as a progressive narrative. Students are encouraged to evaluate diverse sources conveying different subjectivities on historical figures and events and reach their own conclusions. It isn't just that I doubt very much that Seacole has been "elevated" above Nightingale in text books or the curriculum followed by schools, but that the historical skills students have been equipped with would lead them to question that anyway, right from Year 3 in my DDs' case. Obviously that will all change when it is taught based on Cameron and Gove's favourite Edwardian book of bedtime stories for good little colonialists......

I am equally though prepared to ensure they are protected too.

Protected from what exactly?

Wuzzup appears to want them to argue with conviction from a position of ignorance on other points of view... Ironically.

Well, depending on her answer to what it is she wants to protect them from, they might well have to do that, wildlings.

Isn't that what schools are about? Teaching pupils to become good citizens who have been given the skills to question, debate , reach their own conclusions and defend their point of view through being facilitated to do so in a safe environment? Protect them from that and what next?

Obviously you have found a "top" indie that does not

Obviously.

The school my DC go to explore foundations of faith in year 7. The emphasis is on Christianity and the Gospels and their background. Then they go on to look at Christ in the Christian tradition (this includes art and and music etc) and something about Chistian martyrs and thinkers, Bonhoeffer for example. Then they go on to philosophy of religion - Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas , Augustine, They do Anselm and something of Descartes and Kant as well. and various ethical debates and more modern theologians and philosophers. Then GCSE with one faith as its basis which picks up much of what has already been done and then similarly at A level.

All independent schools are different. Even at the top.

I'll ask again - what is it you want to protect your DCs from?

Because I think you want to protect them from having to engage with anyone with different views from yours.

But if I'm happy to be told I'm wrong.

Wuzzup you have demonstrated that you don't know much about state schools through your statements about music.

I wonder what Wuzzups DCs would have made of the Haredi on my plane?
Would they have been able to recognise them as Herdi and understood where that placed them among the different faiths?
Would they have understood why the young lady in a hijab looked so uneasy in the boarding queue?

It amazes me that anybody would cough up school fees and then leave their children isolated from knowledge of the global world around them.

And as for the 2000 year old philosophy of religion, I'll stick to this version

Wuzzup my grandmother was in the forage corps and died in service of the flu in 1918. One of the reasons my dad, her son, who was orphaned at a ludicrously young age as a result wore the White poppy despite having served in both the European and Asian theatres in WWII (he was in the siege of Malta and later in Burma) is that one of the things about the White poppy was that it also represented the service of people like his mum which the red poppy did not (these days the British legion claims it does, but it didn't in the beginning, and that was one of the many drivers behind the White poppy movement). You need to do some research.