Do you have to be a Christian to work in a Church of England school?

[LucasNorthsTwiglets]

I'm interested in a job at such a school and the job description says that applicants must be able to support their Christian ethos. I am not a Christian but can, of course, support all the values that the school lists, as they are basic good morals that every human should have, Christian or not!
Is the school even allowed to ask applicants what their religion is?

There are plenty of non christians who work in faith schools. All they can do is ask you to support the "ethos of the school." There are some jobs that can have a legitmate religious requirement, but being a teacher is not one of them. For example if you were applying for a job as a church of england priest then you would need to be a christian.

I think an employer can ask an applicant what their religion is for the purposes of equality monitoring. I don't think that they can refuse to hire you on the basis of your religion.

They can't discriminate against you based on your religion... yet weirdly they can discriminate against the children that they accept based on their parents' religion or lack thereof. I find this an odd contradiction.

No, you don't have to be ... it may help, though! In my interview, I talked about the way I could support the values and mentioned working with the parish vicar in my last post, which I had done ... no-one specifically asked me if I were Christian or if I attended church, which I didn't. I got the job!

You might need a reference from a priest though.

No you don't need to be Christian or get a reference from a priest...
It is likely you will be asked at interview how you would support the ethos of the school.

No you don't need to be a Christian.
You may be asked how you would support the ethos. You may be asked if certain practises would make you uncomfortable (eg. prayers or crosses on heads of willing children on Ash Wednesday). My DCs very Christian C of E had lots of non- C of E staff, several of other religions and quite a few of no religion.

Where we live children don't need to be Christians to attend a CofE school never mind the staff.

It depends on how easy they can recruit and if it's c of e or Catholic. While technically they can't discriminate because of faith, in reality, if they have enough candidates you just won't get to interview.

In my area there has never been a shortage of primary teachers but there has been at secondary. Funnily enough the number of non-faith teachers percentage wise has always been far lower in primary than secondary where they couldn't be as choosy.

Even when I did my training, our tutors said you can always apply but don't get your hopes up. Friends working in some of these schools, which are lovely schools, laughed about the situation too. I do know people who have got jobs in faith schools who aren't of that faith or no faith but they tend not to have applied as a main scale teacher eg they had specific skills or the school struggled to recruit in the first place.

Having said all that I've applied in the past. Never got to interview though

Thanks, everyone - much appreciated.

www.churchofengland.org/media/1515276/employmentlegislationrelatingtoappointmentsinchurchschools.pdf

I didn't say you would need a priest's reference, I said you might. Last time I applied to work at a c of e school I was asked for one. Catholic schools routinely request them. You might not be able to provide one but they can ask!

As soapbox said; if you get to interview depends on who else applies!

But that is true regardless of the faith thing. You know what I mean

Might be worth thinking about how you would feel about the Christian nature of the school if you got the job. I have a friend who has just moved on from working in a faith school as she could not cope with the heavily Christian elements of the school she worked in. As an atheist she really struggled with what she saw as indoctrination of young children.. She said that the 'Christian ethos' was omnipresent, so for example , the eco-school work was done from the point of view that 'God has given us this beautiful world so we need to look after it' and if they had a dilemma, they were encouraged to think 'what would Jesus do?'. She also had to lead her class in prayer three times per day. Some people would be fine with that, but she felt uncomfortable..

That's very useful, meditria, thank you! Librarycard, I have wondered about that. I am also an atheist but as it isn't a teaching job I was hoping I would be specifically asked to teach their ethos, just to go along with it.

I wouldn't be specifically...!

would independent schools be different? I saw an advert for a deputy head of all girls Catholic school and the first essential was to be a practicing Christian (ideally Catholic) and one of the three references to come from parish priest. I guess in that case it is up to the school and wouldn't be discriminatory. ..anyone had this experience?

I'm a main scale teacher at a C of E and Catholic school. I'm an atheist, so are lots of the staff. Unless applying for a post teaching RE, I don't think being religious advantages you over being an excellent practitioner.

librarycard makes a good point.

I have very little time for schools who look for Christian teachers (or other religious affiliations) above employing the very best teacher! Schools should employ the person with the best skill set, not the most devout religious one!

I think if you want to apply for SLT post in a faith school, they do expect you to be religious. There is a qualification for working in catholic education, catholic certificate in religious studies, which they expect you to have if you want to apply for higher posts. Other than that, as long as you support the ethos of the school, there shouldn't be any discrimination (although I suspect there is).

Not expected, catholic a bit different though.
I usually get round the 'christian ethos' question by saying 'having been brought up in a traditional Christian family (could supplement this with community) and attended a church school myself as a child I very much value the moral values which are the key messages of the Christian faith and I acknowledge the advantages in terms of creating a community within the school of celebrating key events in the calendar year, in line with British values.'
Usually that spiel distracts from what they were actually asking i.e. do you attend church/do you believe and it contains enough buzz words to please them.

As a governor at a CofE school, I've sat on interview panels for SLT posts, and whilst the questions about supporting the school's Christian ethos were asked, it didn't stop us appointing the best candidates who happened to be non-Christians. Teaching staff in the main aren't practising Christians either, so I wouldn't spend too much time worrying about what you can't change.

When you do your research about what makes the school tick, you'll find plenty of clues about the kind of values they're looking for. Good luck.

I'd be more careful than that. A "Christian ethos" might refer to a decent set of shared moral values, where the only annoying thing is that the school thinks that this is somehow distinctively Christian when it is just about being a good person. On the other hand it might be some ghastly evangelical dump with total contempt for kids' rights to freedom of religion and where the kids are dragged off to a nearby church at every excuse. librarycard cites a horrible example of that ilk. The problem is that "supporting a Christian ethos" can mean a world of different things - if it includes explicit evangelism I suggest you look elsewhere.