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.

Maybe UK tax payers, like French tax payers, want the state to meet a large proportion of the costs of faith schools?

Maybe we should ask them.

Why don’t you ask your MP?

I have!

So when’s the referendum?

Maybe UK tax payers, like French tax payers, want the state to meet a large proportion of the costs of faith schools?

I'm a UK tax payer. I don't. I want state education to treat all children to be treated equally, regardless of their parents' beliefs.

Yeah, Catholic schools really are a force for good.

if they could no longer discriminate and all the Catholic schools shut up shop, I would love to see what all the attendees of the schools had to say about it, what the public at large had to say about it and what kind of a PR disaster it would be for the Catholic church. Bring it on!

And this is what it's really about isn't it? Let's shut Christian (catholic schools). It's not about improving education it's about having a go at Christians.

Boko is it only catholic schools that aren't a force for good?

Talk about twisting that post! It was not saying it would be great if Catholic schools closed. Quite the opposite! And it was only having a go at the church's stance in the context of people vehemently arguing the Church would perversely close all its schools if required to apply the same equality law as everyone else.

I am not sure why you don't see that improving education for the least advantaged in our society is as laudable a goal as improving the average standard of education.

“It's not about improving education it's about having a go at Christians.”

Oh this tired old trope.
“It’s not right that people of faith have the choice of a third more schools than people without faith”
“How dare you bash Christians!”

Longest do you not think that's what we all want? Absolutely, I believe in this passionately. These schools select because they are oversubscribed, they are religious schools so they prioritise in that order. The answer it to ensure other schools perform, why take away choice, this will be just as divisive.

Bert indeed that old trope.

Don't have a go at Christians cause it's actually not the fault of Christians that schools in this country are terrible.

“Longest do you not think that's what we all want?”
Actually, no I don’t. I think that many people want the best education for their coterie and don’t care very much about anyone else. Hence the support for selective faith schools and grammar schools. You can’t believe in selective education and simultaneously believe in the best possible opportunities for all children regardless of their backgrounds.

I agree with Bertrand. I actually don't think schools in this country are terrible, but they're a real mixed bag. There's no real incentive among those who actually have the clout to do something about it to address the worst schools because they have the ways and means to avoid sending their kids there. In fact some people prefer things this way because the riff raff are kept tidily away from their selective or quasi selective schools. It's not until everyone has an equal skin in the game that schools will improve across the board. This isn't laying the fault at Christians' door but honestly, when you have someone who is shut out of their local school because of their religion, or because their parents would never think to play any kind of game go get them in, and you have 22 pages of posts defending that as at best inevitable and at worst entirely desirable, I just want to cry.

You can’t believe in selective education and simultaneously believe in the best possible opportunities for all children regardless of their backgrounds.

There is no such thing as non selective education. Everyone has to believe in selective education because all education is selective. The issue is which selection criteria you prioritize.

I take the point about selection by house price, and think more should be done to address that too (I think there are simple fixes that could be done but in most places there's a lack of political will for exactly the same reasons I posted above) but I still think that avoids the most heinous aspect of selection which I'd when someone lives very close to a school that it supposed to serve their community but they cannot attend it, especially when this is because of their faith as in any other scenario that'd be illegal, for good reason.

“Don't have a go at Christians cause it's actually not the fault of Christians that schools in this country are terrible”

1. Schools in this country are not terrible. There are some terrible schools.
2. It is the fault of Christians that they allow unfair backdoor selection to take place without the outrage that anyone who cared about education for all would feel.

I think, longest, that you right that people have a legitimate grievance when they feel shut out of a community, rather than a school per se. If everyone in your village is CofE and you aren’t and your DC ends up at a community school in another area, that isolates your child and family. But does this really happen?

I described exactly how it happens in my area. It's not a village, but if you live close to the Catholic school and are not Catholic you run a very real risk of not being eligible to attend any school in your local area, and get allocated one that is the other end of the borough. This could well also be a faith school.

But I don't see how it makes that much difference if it's just the school you're shut out of. To me it's like the council refusing to collect your bin because you are Muslim, or something. Just horrifically wrong. You won't convince me otherwise.

But why would you want to go to the Catholic School if you don’t like faith schools and aren’t a Catholic? Where I used to live there were 4 or 5 schools within a radius of 1500 metres of our home. We sent the DC to a school 1500 away because that was our community.

Yes, and you had the choice to!
The non-Catholic family does not have that choice because there is no school prioritising them over more local families. So if their local school shuts them out on religious grounds they have no local school because you have to live within 0.2 miles to get in to the non-faith schools. A local faith school is better than one miles away (which ironically might well also be a faith school because if the LEA has allocated you a school place that's job done, even if it doesn't meet your faith/nom faith criteria).

Plus also, faith is just one aspect of a school. My DC attend a VC school. I would much rather it wasn't one, tbh, and this was ony "cons" list for the school but, having visited the two schools we might be able to get into (not the Catholic and VA ones we wouldn't), we preferred it on balance and it's also our nearest school. You would prefer a faith school but no one is barring you from the alternative because of your faith so you are still permitted to weigh up both options, whereas the non-catholic family is not. Is that fair, really?

My DC participate in the church services and I console myself that they are at least learning about an aspect of our shared culture that I wouldn't teach them directly.

I don't really see people as not of my community because they have a different faith.

You make a strong case, lurker.

I don't have an issue with religious schools existing but it is unfair to discriminate against kids because their parents haven't made enough visits to church.

If parents are willing to accept they are sending their kids to a Catholic school and they will be taught the Catholic faith, they should be eligible. Just as religious parents are free to send their kids to non-religious schools.