Church schools should stop discriminating against teachers and pupils, say church leaders

[edam]

This news story is interesting. New group of church leaders and 'secular figures' campaigning to stop religious schools discriminating against non-religious families and staff, or those from the 'wrong' denomination.

(I have looked to see if there's a thread on this already but couldn't find one.)

Oh... why do we have a state relion. Well, that's a whole nother debate really. Why does anyone have one? Do you think that all of the countries on Earth should bag their assisciations with whatever their chosen deity happens to be. Now, there is a campaign to start WWIII.

You could always move to the United States. It's a lovely place, where church and state are indeed separated by law. (although not always in practice) But, at least you'd have a credible argument when you say they should be separate.

iorekbyrnison;

yes, i do have a choice of all the schools in my area, and as i said earlier, 2 of them actually perform better than my sons school. that didn't stop me sending my son to the catholic school. we're catholic and i want my children to have a catholic education. it would be completely unfair for a child that isn't catholic to be admitted before a catholic child, you surely must accept that?

and yes, i would accept my child being at the bottom of a list for other schools if we didn't fit all the criteria, of course i would. if you want to go to a catholic school become a catholic...people do! you can't have the argument that just because you pay a tiny proportion of your taxes towards them, you deserve a piece of it.

what about the millions of people that don't have children? they're still paying taxes towards education. or should everyone have loads of children just to get their moneys worth.

WE have religion affiliated hospitals in the states. They don't discriminate on who they treat, but rather the church gets a say in what services they provide. For example, a catholic hospital will not give you an abortion, even if medically mecessary. I personally wouldn't set foot in one of those hospitals.

But, of course, in the US you have a choice about what hospital you go to. So avoiding them is not really a problem.

daftpunk - I don't understand why you fail to understand that all citizens should be treated equally whatever their religion. And all children should be treated equally whatever their parents' religion or lack of religion.

To suggest otherwise is discrimination on religious grounds.

It is particularly galling that those religious schools which are funded by the taxpayer - not private schools - should pick and choose which taxpayers are good enough for them. Churches only pay a small proportion of the overall costs of state schools. If they want to exclude one group of children, they should go private.

FWIW I went to a CofE school back in the olden days when there wasn't all this ridiculous fuss about church attendance. Before the Tories brought in so-called 'parental choice' which in fact amounts to the schools choosing the children, not the other way round. It was my local junior school, so I went there, along with children of various denominations. I remember one girl was in the Sally Army, another was Hindu and there were some Catholics. Probably others too but thankfully we weren't really aware of religious differences or thought they were particularly noteworthy. Exactly as it should be.

edam;

i understand quite well that all citizens should be treated equally, but i think you are being a little romantic about all this.

i know all about the different faiths and have friends of all religions (so do my children) but my friends have their religion and i have mine...whats wrong with that? we can all get along happily and learn from each other without being at the same school.

what are you suggesting? banning catholic or any other faith school? surely thats discriminating, if not illegal.

Romantic?! That's not my intention at all...

Am not in favour of banning church or religious schools, merely stopping them discriminating against children based on their parents' faith. As long as parents support the school's ethos, there shouldn't be any 'we are better than you' about it.

Daftpunk and Athene, this is not about banning faith schools, it is about a fair and open admissions policy. I can't put it any more clearly than brummie:

"if you were excluded from those public services on the basis of your colour, gender or sexuality, you'd be able to sue. But it's ok to exclude people of other religion, or those of no religion, from their nearest school?"

Daftpunk - banning all state funded faith schools is exactly what I would suggest.

The fact that our local state funded CofE school does not accept atheism as an acceptable view point is discrimination and should not be tolerated.

It might be different where you have a notional choice of 20 different schools but relgious schools are not acceptable as the only option.

but edam, those schools are there for the catholic families, not for anyone else. if not enough catholics want the places, fair enough, other children can be admitted.

and it's not about "we're better than you" i know some catholic schools that i wouldn't send my dog to.

If that's the case, they should go private. If they are state schools, they should not discriminate. You shouldn't have a state school which says 'we are only for a select few'.

I wouldn't send ds anywhere near a Catholic school, personally, btw. Am lapsed CofE.

AN in the US 65% of citizens believe in a supreme being- I don't really think I would fit in too well in most communities there!

Squeakypop I gave the example of my closest school- it happens to be RC. Now I will tell you about the CE school- 300 yds away. This is the highest performing school in the authority in terms of national standards at Key Stage 2 (and what most people judge schools on via the performance tables).

The children who attend do live closer to the school geographically than the children who attend the RC school- I freely admit this- it has half the intake in terms of numbers of the RC school, and is heavily oversubscribed due to performance. However the families live very much in an enclave, and tend not to be part of the community life in my area. The school community is extremely homogenous, unlike the area we live in.

In our authority, 16% of children are Pakistani- at this school 0%. LA- 7% Indian- the school- 0.5%, LA- 4% Bangladeshi, School- 0%, LA 12% African-Caribbean, School- 3%.
In our authority, 34% of children are eligible for free school meals- at the school only 1% are.
My point is (yawn, sorry) that this school is not inclusive, and does not represent the local community.
I know that they select covertly- it is no secret. This is backed up statistically by the fact that at this school only 1% of pupils have a statement of SEN- as opposed to 3.4% for our authority. Similarly, there are no children on SA+ (school action plus) whereas the aithority has 7.2% on SA+. The school has 4% on School Action (SA) as opposed to the LA almost 13%.

The other confirmation of this is the value added score the school has- which is actually pretty mediocre for our LA. The children they educate to a high standard actually arrive at age 4 with a higher level of literacy and numeracy than those in other schools, so of course they are going to achieve higher levels at the end of it.

Enough illustration? I can go on all day about this

lol..i understand your points completely, and this argument could run and run, (has been argued about for years) so just to finish,

if i lived near another faith school ( islam,for instance) and that school only accepted islamic children (even though it was state funded) i wouldn't have a problem with that. i wouldn't want my kids to go there, why would i? it's not my religion.

and i certainly wouldn't expect them to change their entire admissions policy just to cater for a few families.

have a nice day

daftpunk I reiterate- If catholic (or please- feel free to substitute any religious group) families want to have schools for themselves alone- they can jolly well pay for it. I don't mean a 'voluntary' contribution of £50 or whatever per term- I mean FULL WHACK- 6k a year, or whatever it is that it actually costs to run a school.
Still interested?
Surely- if you want indoctrinate educate your child in your faith, that begins in the home, with the example you set, and the lessons you lay out for your DC. You send them to Sunday School or the Madrasah after school. Chiefly it is about the life you lead.

daftpunk this is where we differ I would have a problem with it- it is discriminatory!

As a secularist, the only way I can have my children indoctrinated educated in the way I want is to pull them out of the system- this seems wrong and sad to me! They have a contribution to make to our community too, and shouldn't be excluded from that due to their parents (oh, all right then, mine!) choices.

All schools descriminate on some grounds to determine who will be accepted. It might be cause you have enough money to live tnear the school. I tmight be ceasu your brother already attends the school. It might because you go to the church. It might be for lots of reason. I personally think selection based on religion is far better then selection based on wealth/class.

If we did not go to the church we do, my kids we be in a different LEA with an inferior education. I find that unacceptable. I am not going to send my kids to a crap school because it happens to be closer. No thanks. (Incidentally, I feel the same way about the "local" hospital)

I just love the thoroughly unchristian attitude of those who support faith schools. It's all, 'well, we don't want your scummy sort in our schools, because we've got the best schol all to ourselves, and your heathen children can go to the scummy ones, ha ha ha." It's extremely unedifying. I wonder, what would Jesus think?

Please elaborate on why you feel discrimination on religious grounds is better than discrimination on wealth. Neither is the choice nor the fault of the child.

BTW- I think it is just to discriminate on favour of siblings, due to the importance of family bonding, and logistics for families.

The sibling rule is fair enough (I don't benefit as I have an only child). Although I'm a tad irritated that it applies to families who move out of catchment - so first child got in on distance, younger ones get in even if they've moved out of our town.

Msdemeanor in Squeakpops defence- she did suggest the exact opposite, in the interests of evangelism!

I'm religious, the boys are raised Christian, we are known to the Vicar and attend Chucrh when we can (SN issues).

I still don't agree that Curch schools houlsd limit entry to faith members only.

For a start, our school is the only Catchment schol, why should my neighbour's kids face an hour trek up a big hill just becuase Mum is, say, Muslim?

Also, I seriosuly don't want the boys raised in a mono culture. Muslims, Jews, Sikhs will be in their lives and that needs to begin now.

Our school is an anomaly- it's faith but not Church due to strange fundng, but all kids face a Christianity exam each year from reception. Funding from the will of the benefactor deoends on this, so its only recently (cue much screeching from Peachy and others to enable this) SN kids have been admtted properly.

If the Church wants to commit to part funding of the education in their community good on them but it should be for the whole community. As Christians we don't only provide friendhip, support whatever to fellow Chrstians, but to humanity at alrge.

'what would Jesus think? '- suffer the little children, that's what!

FWIW not all CHurch schools are in posh expensive areas- the local catholic is in the middle of a big rundown council estate

actually I thought squeakypop's was the only truly Christian viewpoint on this thread. Obviously all this religious education isn't doing much for people's morals.
It's all "If your kids have to walk two miles in the rain, or get a bus to a school which means they will have no local friends, and you will have to drive them to the next village or whatever, I don't care, because I'm alright Jack."

I hadn't read Peachy's comments when I posted btw!

re discrimination by wealth, ok, if a publicly funded state school was allowed to see your bank balance before your child was admitted, and was legally permitted to insist on a letter from the bank manager and your employer to confirm your salary met the school's minimum demands before a child was considered for entry, what would the faith school fans make of that? I could absolutely promise you that school would have brilliant results, despite not selecting academically, so if the results are good, what would be wrong with that method of selection? Why would it be so different to selecting on the basis of the parents' beliefs?

I hadn't read Peachy's comments when I posted btw!

re discrimination by wealth, ok, if a publicly funded state school was allowed to see your bank balance before your child was admitted, and was legally permitted to insist on a letter from the bank manager and your employer to confirm your salary met the school's minimum demands before a child was considered for entry, what would the faith school fans make of that? I could absolutely promise you that school would have brilliant results, despite not selecting academically, so if the results are good, what would be wrong with that method of selection? Why would it be so different to selecting on the basis of the parents' beliefs?