ok, this MUST have been discussed before, but... can someone please explain how a state-funded school can select according to the god-fearing-ness (or otherwise) of a child's parents???

[Tutter]

we all pay the taxes that keep em going

so, why should it matter whether a parent visits a building with a spire once a week, and sings songs therein?

our local primary school asks the question "do you go to church? if not, why do you want your children to attend this school?" (paraphrased)

rebelmum - can assure you that getting a disabled kid into any flipping school is a task not lightly undertaken. they may be first priority on the list, but you need four years worth of reports from six different therapists and at least a year free to argue why the kid needs help with their education at all, before you even end up discussing which school the LEA will aloow them to go to. yes, the lea will allow them to go to - they don't bother to make every school accessible you know - why should a disabled kid want to go to the same school as their brother and sister anyway?
sheesh. and half the time the lea ride roughshod over the parental choice anyway, at least before you've gone through appeal and hired a barrister for the tribunal. it's not like you tick a box saying sn and they wave you through. it's slightly more difficult than a note from the vicar or the address of your house. unnecessary to mention that in a discussion about faith school selection criteria i suggest.

Ah just garbage I read on a prospectus that is written for the benefit of the ofsted inspector then, I should know to take these things with a pinch of salt.. they had photos of the kids doing these great activities and sports etc and the kids I met didn't have a clue about any of it just sports day once a year ..

The state offering didn't suit my needs either Swedes.

no, they ARE first priority - it's just to get them to that point that takes so much paperwork and 'proof' to the principal officer at the lea, that most fall by the wayside. i'd quite like to have popped to church for a singalong for a couple of months and got in to a school of choice armed with a vicar's note. much easier.

That's sad, makes you think that they are just not geared up to provide the support or are the schools deliberately trying to make it difficult?

I'm amazed at some of the admissions policies put on here for some church schools.

At the Catholic secondary school my nephew goes to the criteria are:
(1) Baptised and practising Roman Catholic Boys; and
(2) Other boys.
Note: The School is normally over-subscribed by Category 1 applicants.

Plus you must get a letter of support from the priest (my SIL had the priest round to dinner innumerable times prior to applying). This is 4 pages long.

Then you must fill in the Supplementary Application Form - this is 7 pages long - and it asks you to provide supporting documentation. You get a points score for this form but no explanation is given to how the points are achieved.

How middle class do you think this school is?

not the schools - they are the ones that bear the brunt of the amount of red tape you have to wade through. it's just money. if the lea agree there is a need, they have to pay for it, which is never popular, hence they fanny around for a year and kids end up starting school with no support, or being HE becasue there is nowhere that can cope, and yr R classes all over the land fall apart under the strain!
anyway, didn't mean to hijack, but just wanted to point out that the selection criteria may be a bit misleading.
our nearest school is catholic va with a faith criteria, so we wouldn't have got in anyway!

I doubt very much that the percieved superiority of faith schools is anything to do with the superiority of superstition over reason. It's a combination of various factors from this list and not true of every superstition school anyway:
Lots of determined parents pushing for every advantage possible for their DC and paying a lot of attention to the DCs' education.

Expensive school uniform helping to keep the chavscum and the proles out.

High pass rate of children entered for exams achieved by not allowing the supposedly thicko kids to enter for the exams at all

Parents thinking that a faith school might stop their children from having sex

Parents thinking that a school which turns out quiet, submissive, obedient, conformist children is giving them a 'good' education when the opposite is true.

QueenMeabh - I'm guessing from your post that your nephews schools is very middle class - in the grand scheme of things, is it a problem if a school is middle class?

Or is it only a problem if you're middle class, think you're entitled for your dcs to attend a middle class school, but don't qualify on religous grounds so have to send them to your local comp.

As I said before, it's not the existence of these schools it's the social segregation that occurs when the middle classes colonise the school. It actually has nothing to do with faith.

I went to a Catholic comprehensive school, but because I grew up in a town with single sex grammar schools, the middle classes tended to favour those. My school was truly pretty socially and academically diverse. And it was a very good school.

swedes - are you saying in that case that you could remove faith from the equation and it would make little or no difference?

Yes quite, Swedes. My newphew's school does well not because it is a faith school but because it is full of middle class children whose parents know how to play the system. Just like the near-by CoE secondary.

Why do I keep typing "newphew" instead of nephew?

My dcs went to a Catholic school because they were able to get a place there and the alternatives available were unacceptable. I'm not a middle class parent who knew how to play the system..far from it. I wasn't even aware that Catholic schools accepted non catholic children until a neighbour, who's son I knew went to the school, told me. I don't think anyone in their wildest imagination could call my family middle class and there is definately not a majority of middle class pupils in the school. I actually can't think of any I would consider middle class and the vast majority live locally within the catchment area. Yet the school is one of the higher achieving schools in this area.
No expensive uniform
No exam exclusion (my nephew at a non catholic state high school was not entered in to his ks3 english exam)
I'm under no illusion that the school will stop my dcs having sex
Anyone who would describe my dcs as quiet, conformist, obedient and submissive is deluded!!!!

UQD - Personally, I wouldn't want to send my children to school with children whose parents are principleless. I wouldn't mind sending my children to school with children whose parents are (imo) religiously bonkers though.

Although, interestingly I read a report recently that at multi cultural schools there isn't as much mixing in as you might think. I'll look for the report I read.

I don't mind sending my children to school with children of those who subscribe to all religious bonkers-ness or none. What I do mind is this being a criterion for selection.

UQD - Do you mind cleverness being a criterion for selection?

I object to the state promoting and supporting segregation, frankly.

swedes - actually, I don't - and I think you know I don't - because that's an educational criterion, and that's what schools are about. (I an an unashamed, unreconstructed academic elitist.) If people want to be goddy they can do so at church, temple, synagogue or wherever.

I am grrrr

UQD But as I said to Pruners before, on average faith schools perform better academically than non-faith schools.

Can I just say I think calling for a ban on faith schools is wrong. Faith schools should be allowed to continue to exist but their selection criteria should be open to all who wish to attend and then if they are still oversubscribed a fair lottery should be applied.

I think margoandjerry has the right approach. The best deal she can do for her child in her area is a place in a good state faith school - so M&J goes to Church to ensure she gets a place.

Entirely pragmatic, with a reasonable degree of self-sacrifice. In order to achieve most of what is worthwhile in life, pragmatism and some self-sacrifice will be necessary.

There is a point at which one needs to stop trying to change the world and to get on with doing what is necessary to ensure the best educational outcome for one's own child.

Of course - it's what we all do.
But we can still be annoyed that we have to do it!

I don't think it's worth expending the energy being annoyed when you can't change anything. Expend the energy earning money or going to church in order to ensure the best academic environment for your child