bbc news tonight - parents lying to get into schools made me wonder...

[jollygumbear]

if you rent your house out and then rent yourself in catchment and live there for a year does that make the application for the school illegal?

i won't say "wrong" as that's another thread as its all about personal opinion!

thanks

My DCs go to sunday school at a local church. The school linked to the church is c of e voluntary controlled. Therefore places are allocated by distance and there are no church places. If I wanted to send my children to the school linked to the church we attend we would not be able to get a place as it is oversubscribed and there are no church places. Fortunately there is another C of E aided school and we were able to get a church place there. If both schools were voluntary controlled we would be driving miles to primary school as we do not live right by a primary school so would be bottom of the list for all the local ones.

However you change the system there will be a set of people for whom things are not fair. When I was little my mother told me "life isn't fair"!

Zephire yes in principle they are both wrong, but we are not in an ideal world are we? And yes the values I mentioned are not solely reserved to faith school but they are certainly more encouraged there. I wonder what a 15 year old in the worst school in the city would say if you told him to respect his peers.

At the end of the day, I have said what I have to say. Most people who don't put their children in faith school can't see the value of faith schools, the people who do put their children in faith school disagree. And perhaps you think that this is discrimination, but people who are covertly discriminated against because of their means are harder done by.

The system is unfair, the system is not working, but instead of bashing one type of people it would probably be more constructive to ponder why the system is not working and how to address it.

Personally I don't go around bashing people who put their kids in private school. Nor those who "cheat" to put their children in the "good" schools because at the end of the day, they all want the best for their kids. I just feel sad for those that are stuck with a substandard school because there is nothing they can do about it.

lifeistooshort, as it happens I would prefer dd to be at her local faith school, as much for the ethos as anything else. But she is not eligible.

I'm still having trouble understanding why the child of practising Christians needs a school that teaches respect more than any other child does.

Zephrine - where's the evidence that schools with a religious character don't operate fair admissions processes. Even the adjudicator in his last review only found a handful of technical erros across over 7,000 such schools.

Or by fair do you mean anyone irrespective of faith should be allowed to attend such faith schools.

Yes that is what I mean.

Zephirine - thank you. As I thought so you do want to abolish schools with a religious character.

Do you also want to allow allcomers to attend Grammar Schools irrespective of their entry requirements?

Zephirine - what about the evidence for your proposed solution. Or would you prefer not to let the evidence to get in the way of your prejudice

zanzibarmum - do you think it's fair that my DS2 was precluded a place at my local faith secondary on the basis of my unwillingness to proclaim faith? Even though he is a proper Christian? Even though some of the parents who did apply and gain a place openly profess to just playing the system?

Who wants to go to school with people like this?

Swedes - as I have often made clear I don't think parents should cheat either by lying where they live or faking religious practice. There should be strong sanctions against such parents.

I also think schools of a religious character (as they must) take non-faith applicants where those schools are under-subscribed - for eg some 30% of children in Catholic schools nationally are not from the Catholic faith.

But where such a school is oversubscribed I support the GB in allocating places on the basis of their criteria i.e. people who meet the relgious criteria (fairly) getting in over those who don't. So yes I do think your DS2 shouldn't get a place - besides what is a Christian who can't or won't proclaim their faith?

'And yes there is Sunday school but their are values in faith schools which are instilled daily and that is why I want DD to go, like respect your teacher, respect your peers, work hard and be rewarded or praised when you have done something right'

but all schools do that, not only faith schools

I am not saying you are a hypocrite. You are taking personal offence when I don't mean any. I just cannot see why your child needs a different school to my children when both of us (it seems) believe in the same values.

agree with Zanzibarif you are a Christian, why won't you profess your faith? You are applying for a faith school. And I really am dubious about people cheating the faithschool system. Perhaps some do, but I don't think it is that many. It seems like an awful lot of trouble to attend a speciacl couse, get baptised and get your children baptised just to get into a school.

zanzibarmum, your responses are bizarre. Allowing the children of non-Christians or Christians of other denominations does not equate to abolishing faith schools (see my earlier post about my own school).

Grammar school admissions are (in principle at least) about the needs of the individual children - not about their parents' beliefs.

What is the evidence you speak of, and what do you think are my prejudices?

And I can't begin to think what your reply to Swedes even means.

But if the 'faithness' of a school is expressed by its ethos, why would admitting people without reference to their faith be abolishing it?

TBH [small voice] has this really got loads worse than it used to be?

Swedes said that she is not a churchgoer, but her son is and has been confirmed at his own request. Why is that hard to understand? Do you really think that he should be refused a place because his parents don't go to church on Sundays?

lifeistooshort - I can assure you that there are plenty of lapsed Catholics where I live who have found their faith after investigating the available local schools.

Haven't read all thread yet but in response to lifeistooshort all those I know that go to a faith school, and practice every week, are as much believers as I am = a big fat 0! Nobody will tell you when you first meet them but let some time pass and they are all huffing and puffing at the efforts.
Obviously not all but ime many do fake it.

I am catholic in that I was baptised and had first communion and attended church when a child. In my country you do that as default and does not necessarily mean you or your parents 'believe'. Most do not.
I could have pretended, and I would have done had no alternative choice but luckily I had a good choice of non-faith schools around me (still struggled to get in though).
I am happy that my children go to a non faith school but I wouldn't have worried if they did.

Zephirine then that is just sad, but it is human nature and faith school shouldn't be judged badly because of that. It still goes back to the issue of parents cheating because they feel like they have not alternative and wanting the best for their children (the methods to achieve the goal I do not condone, the ultimate goal I cannot blame)

Fox I agree, but I am sure it is much harder in some parts and school in this country to ensure that these values are upheld...And yes I think personal offence was meant when you suggested I would bin my principle to get my DC in a "good" school but I must have misinterpreted your post I am sure

I'm not judging faith schools badly. I like faith schools. I just don't think they should be allowed to select children on the basis of how often their parents go to church.

Zephirine I understand that but then they wouldn't be faith schools anymore would they? How would they retain their faith character otherwise?

pippi whilst it is depressing to read that about your friends at least by going to church they are probably paying collection money which goes to the church and enables it to partially fund the church schools.

Your experience is not the same as mine. I know a lot of people who go to church and are committed christians. They live near the school so do not need to go to church to get a school place. They go to church because they want to.

lifeistooshort, as I said earlier, and as choosy floosy said, it is the ethos of the school that determines its religious character, not the pupils' backgrounds.

My own school was a private convent. Because they need the fees, they can't afford to turn pupils from non-Catholic backgrounds away, and consequently around half of the pupils when I was there were not Catholic. It was still very definitely a Catholic school with mass twice a week etc.

same experience as womble here. Also sometime you are made to feel ashamed that you are of a faith and if talking to non faith friends, it might be possible that they would tell you they fake just because they would be embarassed of the flood of questions that might follow or worried of being witched hunt (which happens). Some people prefer and easy life..just look at the stick I got for defending faith schools. If I had know, I would probably have not posted at all. Some opinions are better received than others I guess

I'm looking for the stick you got for defending faith schools.

Can't find it.

ah well again probably a fruit of my very vivid and creative imagination then?

I think I am done with this conversation now by the way so am off, won't be provoked into coming back

The Bishop who baptised my son had no problem at all welcoming my son into his fold. It's absurd that a school proclaiming a Christian ethos would not admit that same boy. I was brough up a Catholic. I am very fond of the Catholic church. Faith schools admissions have absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with faith.

A lot of the people on this thread defending faith schools' admissions are being terribly unChristian.