Attending Church, purely to get to a certain school

[sleepydad3000]

They're aren't many things I feel so strongly about, but this issue is one of them. I am currently looking at schools for my daughter. I am a non religious person and my partner is a none practising Catholic, doesn't go to church at all anymore.

I personally think it's wrong on a moral level to exploit a church for 6 months or however long, just to get your child to a certain school. It's almost like, "Oh hi, yes thankyou, I've got what I needed, you'll never see me again!"

2 schools near me are both decent, 1 outstanding and 1 good (Ofsted ratings) interestingly enough, the NON Catholic school has the higher mark as of 2017.... just saying. Both schools are great in my view, religion aside. But I'd feel awful and wrong and like I was cheating or manipulating the system, just to get my girl to a certain school, and then waving bye bye to the church after, as I know for a fact, my partner and I have no intention of going to church afterwards.

I ask because you very consistently claim that you would like a comprehensive secular school. But how can you know what such schools are like if you’ve never experienced one?

What do you think a secular school would be like?

Bertrand - it is a fact of life that money, talent, religious affiliation, social networks etc open doors. Rather than trying to stamp out door opening practices we should be encouraging everyone to open as many doors as possible!

Some of our children attended a (well regarded) secular comprehensive school. It was a horrible place.

“we should be encouraging everyone to open as many doors as possible!”

Good. How about the Church opens the doors of its schools to all comers, then?

“Some of our children attended a (well regarded) secular comprehensive school. It was a horrible place”
In what country?

The Church opens its doors to people who open themselves to its teaching. It’s totally straightforward.

Ah. I’m out.

If you want advantage in life, it’s not a one way street. You cannot simultaneously wish to be embraced by the Church while rejecting its teachings.

An advantage in life? Good grief! Access to education free at the point of delivery is one of the basic tenants of life in the UK and is what we pay taxes for.

Religious discrimination against children and religious segregation of children should not have a place in a largely secular country.

Access to education free at the point of delivery is one of the basic tenants of life in the UK and is what we pay taxes for.

It is understandable that governments don’t shout about the fact that they have never managed to be autonomous of churches to deliver education for free at the point of delivery. It is a bit embarrassing for them!

All churches have to do is drop the faith admissions criterion. Then they can spread their magic touch to all comers. The schools will continue to “better” because it’s all about the ethos and nothing to do with selection at all.......

No Bertrand. Churches have every right to want to prefer to serve families who embrace their teachings.

“No Bertrand. Churches have every right to want to prefer to serve families who embrace their teachings.”

But not at the tax payers expense.

I don't even believe that faith schools are better!

The evidence on this is weak. Where church schools do achieve marginally better results, it is usually down to faith-based selection which actually leads to social selection, which unfairly benefits middle class, educated and better-off parents.

Research published in 2016 by the Education Policy Institute found that after adjusting for "disadvantage, prior attainment and ethnicity," pupils in primary schools with a faith ethos "seem to do little or no better than in non-faith schools".

Pupils in secondary schools with a faith ethos record only "small average gains" over non-faith schools or "just one-seventh of a grade higher" in GCSE results. The Education Policy Institute study concluded that such minute gains came with a risk "of increased social segregation". It also noted that "the average faith school admits fewer pupils from poor backgrounds than the average non faith school." Faith schools can operate extremely convoluted admissions procedures and many are able to select their pupils from more affluent backgrounds than non-faith schools."

More recently in 2017, a report by the Institute for Public Policy Research found that there is "no evidence" to suggest denominational schools in Scotland achieve better results than their non-denominational counterparts.

Surely it is for the christian churches and the small numbers of other faith schools to be embarrassed that they take state funding but practice religious apartheid?

But not at the tax payers expense.

Churches and the tax payer fund faith schools jointly. It is therefore only right and proper that both have a say in governance of faith schools. Why is this so very hard for you to grasp?

“Surely it is for the christian churches and the small numbers of other faith schools to be embarrassed that they take state funding but practice religious apartheid?”

Of course it is. But Christian privilege is so entrenched that there are some who will never agree.

MargoLovebutter - all the evidence on relative performance between school type (state, faith, independent etc) tends to demonstrate that academic outcomes are determined by social status of families. It is, however, very wrong to conclude from this that selective education does not add value - the value is just not captured in exam results.

Surely it is for the christian churches and the small numbers of other faith schools to be embarrassed that they take state funding but practice religious apartheid?

There is nothing remotely embarrassing about this from the Church’s point of view. It is the state that is hypocritical, not the Church.

BertrandRussell I think you may be right that christian privilege is so entrenched that some will never agree.

Ownership of schools is not “Christian privilege” (as compared with white privilege, male privilege etc).

State hypocrisy (not being honest about the fact that the State is happy for the Church to continue to subsidize state education) is the issue you are all struggling with, not the reverse.

It's both, clearly. It's a sorry state of affairs that the State feels beholden to the Church to such a degree that the Church is allowed to negotiate am exemption from a pretty important anti-discrimination law. The Church, on the other hand, wants to have its cake and eat it - to accept State funding without actually delivering a public service on an equal basis to all.

Here's another real life example. Where I live there is a private ambulance service that serves only the local Hassidic Jewish community . Now imagine they suddenly went cap in hand to the State saying they have the ambulance fleet but no paramedics, petrol, medical supplies . They want the State to take on responsibility for providing these as it's for the public good, but they want to carry on only serving the Hassidic Jewish community and no one else. Is that a reasonable request? They own the ambulances after all and it's saving the NHS money.

longestlurkerever - that’s a false analogy because the cost of covering the ambulance is within the grasp of the NHS.

The issue with schools is that the state cannot afford to provide schools for everyone from the public purse and so, for all sorts of historic reasons, is in a joint venture with churches to do so for part of its provision. After this thread, I can only conclude that the state does a very good job of pulling the wool over the eyes of many of its citizens!

I think it's a good analogy because the fact that the State is not in a position to refuse doesn't make the request any more reasonable.