Sending children to Sunday school to get into good secondary

[wildawake]

What are your views on this?

I'm an atheist, I don't want it to be part of my children's life. However there are 2 very good schools in our town. To even have a chance of getting into either, they need to be seen to be attending church on a weekly basis.

I'm so conflicted. Makes me feel very uncomfortable, apparently they don't do much praying it's more crafts etc, but a register is taken which can be used when supporting school applications.

If it was up to me I wouldn't even be considering, however DH thinks I'm being very narrow minded, selfish, holding them back. They are excellent schools, both outstanding.

ALL schools in England have to teach RE.

The catholic school where I teach devotes 2.5 hours a week to RE which doesn't include assemblies, collective worship or hymn practice. I think that's a fair chunk of the week!

I wouldn’t want my child anywhere near a school with this tripe in their admissions requirement.

In my experience (I work for a church and fill in the referrals) they only ask do you attend regularly. It's up to each church to then interpret what regularly means. We are experiencing the annual rush of baptisms at the moment as primaries have had open days recently. We generally only sign off if the family attends at least term time fortnightly - and no with us you can't just drop off the kids at Sunday club because parents have to remain on the premises in church, it's not a licenced crèche.

This discussion came up a few weeks back. I responded because we have done exactly this - attended church in order to get our children into an outstanding secondary.
I feel a bit like I can't be ar&ed to go into it again, but basically, we want the best education possible for our children, and we are prepared to do what it takes to achieve that.
I have no issue with christian values. I don't personally believe - I don't take communion and I don't pray and I don't expect my kids to if they don't want to, however our vicar is a friend. He doesn't care why people attend his church - only that they do.
The criteria for us, is that we (the parents) attend, and the admissions is based on times per month x years of attendance. It doesn't state specifically that you have to be religious, and I have never lied about it. We do what we feel is necessary.
I have no doubt many of my friends whose kids attend the local secondary have issues with our decision, but they are all too polite to say so. The local secondary is fine, but there are aspects that we aren't happy with. We made the right decision for our child, and we are mulling over whether its the right place for DS2 (and that decision has nothing to do with religion)

Three DCs went to church primary and secondary. They are all atheists despite this. It doesnt take unless the parents are committed church going believers, even then.

Thanks @sugarbum can I ask how they knew the times you attended? Surely their not a register for adults?

Ridiculous and hypocritical basically. Myself my partner were talking about this the other day. Nearly as bad as people who don’t go to church but want to get married in one for nice pictures

@deadsexy no-one keeps a register. Basically the vicar just made a (generous) estimation on how often he saw us knocking about at church. I help out at Sunday school as well to get us extra brownie points, although this doesn't 'officially' count. Its a small community so he knows who comes and goes.

I have no problem with this.

The rule isn't that you must have faith. The rule is that you must sit in a certain building regularly. But you can't then go complaining you don't like the 'religious ethos' of the school if you are happy for you and your child to have got in under a faith criteria.

Interestingly (or not) I have just made a mental note to drip feed Christian knowledge into my y9 DD over the next 6 months, as she has selected RS for GCSE and has limited background knowledge.

So you can happily view church attendance as educational if you feel so inclined. Just like you might view visiting museums or whatever.

Ridiculous and hypocritical basically.

More or less ridiculous or hypocritical than preaching tolerance and inclusion but then taking taxpayers money to segregate five year olds by faith, disproportionately exclude disadvantaged children and maintain their privileged position in state institutions?

I'd be fine with it. State schools shouldn't be allowed to select by religion or church attendance.
I agree with this. It's wrong that you should have to do this to be able to use a good local school paid for by tax payers money (and not only Christian tax payers) but if that's the system i wouldn't care if people fake religion to get in.

@JassyRadlett hmm hard to decide. I’m confused why combining religion and education is still a thing. I don’t agree with that. But at least these schools are upfront and honest about it, rather than pretending to be religious to get your child a place in a school

I go to church regularly and I would have no problem with this. The criteria (for CofE schools anyway - I think Catholic schools are slightly different) is attendance, not faith. No one is going to give you a spiritual x-ray to see if you're "faking it".

Truth is, people go to church for all kinds of reasons. I went initially as I needed a quiet place to go in between hospital appointments. Faith, for me, came later. Some people like the music. Some people like the sense of community and meet people who become friends. For some it's the only opportunity for contemplation in an overly hectic life. And yes, some are jockeying for a school place for their children.

Please don't beat yourself up about this, and ignore those who say to even contemplate this is hypocritical. It really isn't.

I agree, it is not for others to get into why anyone attends church. If the church are happy to sign whatever then that is up to them.

But at least these schools are upfront and honest about it, rather than pretending to be religious to get your child a place in a school

Is it better to be openly discriminatory and hypocritical than to follow the rules of that discriminatory system, to try to reduce its impact on your own child?

I used to be very judgemental about people who did this, time has mellowed me and I now think if that's the system then play it. Good luck OP

Yep weary - ours quite clearly says child baptised AND child attending church at least once a month for the year before the application. We've made sure its at least once a month!

Hideously unfair and wrong system so wouldn’t judge anyone for playing it. How dare largely state funded institutions ban local children because their parents are the “wrong” religion? It’s outrageous

They are not faith schools - they are inclusive of all faiths and non.

They are not terribly inclusive when they prioritise children of parents who practise that faith over other children....

Your child should benefit from a high quality education

No evidence for this, btw. Church schools only do better when they are able to select their intakes when oversubscribed - that is, filter out many of the children from more deprived backgrounds.

They don’t prothletise in cofe schools - yes they pray and quote scripture but pupils are not obliged to do the same.

Total semantics. They tell them what others believe, but that the Christian god is the real one and their interpretation of the bible is the correct one. I’ve never attended an assembly at my son’s school (not my choice of school, but here we are) where they were offered an option to pray, or told it was not obligatory. They pray unless their parents have removed them.

A bit off topic but I can understand the child's attendance at church being a criteria.

One of my grandmothers used to take a neighbour's child to mass, I think the child's father had been RC but was dead and the mother wasn't RC. As my grandparents passed the child's door on their walk to mass the mother asked them to take her.

If her parents attendance was looked at it would be 0, but the child was a regular.

"Hideously unfair and wrong system so wouldn’t judge anyone for playing it. How dare largely state funded institutions ban local children because their parents are the “wrong” religion? It’s outrageous"

a) it's not a ban, it's a lower ranking on the admissions criteria

) it really helps if you see these schools as church schools currently operating in cooperation with the state. The vast majority predate the setting up of state schooling, which the country probably couid not have set up,without working with the church schools. These schools are not owned by the state.

No government has ever felt able to afford to buy out the churches. I'm sure it couid not be afforded now.

( And in the Blair years when we thought we were rich, the government actually permitted the setting up of new faith schools, rather than buying out the churches. Without a major party committed to the policy and able to find the money, I don't think there will be headway on making change)

My parents did this. They also knew a local vicar from my dad's time in the forces and he signed off that were church goers.
My dad was an atheist and my mum was a closeted Christian (so believed but wouldn't go to church or anything).

If they hadn't done this I would have been shipped off to boarding school because the other schools in my area were so bad.