Compulsory religion? Can it be avoided?

[Agame]

Dear Mums… my DD and I just moved to Fife, Scotland from Texas, where she went to a British private school with no religious instruction at all, just academic subjects, arts, and fun. She’s been at St Leonards in St Andrews for two weeks. She’s five and in Year 1. She came home singing some Christian hymn and asking what the words meant. This is a shocker for me. I know St L is a great school, but iI don’t like Christian teaching happening behind my back at her school. It says nothing about Christian stuff being taught or infused into the curriculum on their website or any of their materials. What can or should I do? I’m not religious and I do not believe that school is where religion should be taught. There are many religions and many varieties of each. I believe it’s a personal and/or family decision. I’m taken aback to be learning now that religious instruction is compulsory in state schools in Scotland, and seems hard to avoid even in independent schools. Should I write a letter to the head of the school? Do I have any rights here? Are any schools simply secular private schools that leave religion out of the school day? Thank you!

By the time the state got round to providing universal education various churches (mostly CofE as the established and largest church, but the Methodists and Catholics in areas they gad enough of a presence) did as well.

So where there was a church school the state took over (some of) the costs, and let the church crack on. Well, there's a bit more nuance of course, and the details of 'who.is responsible for what) have changed over the last 150 or so years, but that's basically it.

The state didn't want to have to buy/build schools where one already existed, the relevant church continued to own the land and buildings and therefore have a certain amount of control.

I don't know about St Leonards specifically but in other Scottish schools you can pull your child from these things. My school did daily morning assemblies with a hymn and they were a brilliant start to the mornings and I say that as a total non-believer.

You're getting an unnecessarily hard time over not expecting this from the name of the school. It's not a faith school, and there are so many saints in SAINT Andrews I'm not surprised you wouldn't think of it.

I think people having a go at the OP for choosing this school should probably consider that if you live in a small town like St Andrews there are only actually four options for primary schools, one of which is Catholic. If you want to send your child to another independent school you'd have to travel quite a long way, which is not ideal at primary age. There are two state primaries that are non-denominational though, and it would be possible to opt out of any 'worship' type activities that they have to include in their curriculum. I suspect these are pretty light touch though - the children I know that age typically don't know any actual Christmas carols at Christmas, just secular ones like When Santa got stuck up the chimney, and Canongate did a panto this year instead of a nativity play.

Are you aware that GCSE Religious Studies is also compulsory in UK secondary schools?

Since OP is in Scotland, GCSE RS is irrelevant. And in England, taking RS to GCSE is typically optional, not required, except at certain religious schools.

No it isn't.
Just the studying of "religious studies" which might not even be called that (its actually called Culture at my children's school)

Yes. Can you imagine going to some other country and demanding that they don't teach that country's traditional religion in their schools.

It isn't.

I had the same issue when my DS went to school. I'm an atheist and hadn't realised how religion was included in the school day.

My DS was aware that some people believed in a god, and that there were lots of different ones - we had Muslim neighbours, my parents were practicing Catholics and there was a Presbyterian church near by, so he was aware of religion. When he started school I just kept up the message that some people believed but that I didn't, and that I thought that religions were collections of stories, and that he could decide what he believe in himself.

I would have preferred for him not to have been taught a specific religious belief while he was so little, but the up side was that he learned that he didn't have to believe something just because an adult told him, which is a great lesson for a kid to have.

I did stress to him that he shouldn't be mean to kids who believe different things, they believe what their parents have told them.

Death and heaven were issues he struggled with - heaven in a very alien concept to a child who's been told that death is like falling asleep, your life is over and you live on in peoples memories.

@FrenchandSaunders - you don't do GCSE qualifications in Scotland. It's a completely different education system.

I have to admit I feel a little wistful that my DCs won't know all the hilarious Come and Praise primary school hymns that I learnt at my CofE school in the 80s, but as far as I can see, all the local state primary kids round here know very little about Christianity, and overall I'm comfortable with that.

General education about different religions is ok, but saying prayers and singing hymns at the assembly sounds very indoctrinating.

To be fair the website says St Leonard's school follows the IB curriculum but does GCSEs/IGCSEs.
They don't follow the Scottish curriculum.

My parents did this and I asked to go back in as I hated feeling excluded.

I think OP is concerned about compulsory worship, not about children learning about world religions as part of the academic curriculum.

OP, at my kids' school you can ask for them not to take part and it's fine, although the children who don't take part have to do something improving instead, they can't just skip it. There's a Jewish circle which is attended by Jewish children (not relevant for you) and a sort of current affairs/issues of the day chat group for kids who don't want any religion at all.

It probably is worth finding out a bit more about it first. I think as schools in the US aren't allowed to promote religion, the idea of it probably seems more extreme than the reality. It's most likely just a sing song and a bit of mumbling "Harold be thy name". Whether that's unacceptable is obviously your choice but best to make the choice with all the facts.

Straight up Jesus bangers in assembly.

"CROSS OVER THE ROAD, MY FRIEND!!"

LMGTFY

The Education Act 2002 in Scotland requires all maintained schools to provide religious education (RE) and collective worship for all registered pupils. The Act also requires schools to promote pupils' spiritual, moral, and cultural development.

This is for (state) maintained schools, but further digging says independent schools are largely expected to follow the principles of The Education Act.

You'll be hard pressed to find a truly secular education in the UK. I did... in the 1980s.... by attending the French Lycee!

The U.K. is a Christian country.

OP it is basically because in America there is a separation of religion and state (one of the reasons Trump was criticised for bringing faith into some of his rantings). In the UK, and therefore Scotland, state and religion are intertwined whether people like it or not. Our head of state is the King and he is also the head of the (Protestant) church so it is always going to be that Christianity is a part of our schooling. Interestingly, Catholic schools exist for this similar reason. It stems from when Catholics were very much oppressed in this country and not allowed to express their faith in state schools so they had to set up their own to ensure their teachings did not die out.

Do schools in America swear allegiance to the flag every morning? That feels slightly on the road to indoctrination in itself

AngelinaFibres
Me too. Love a Cathedral, love church music, love belting out a hymn. My father, a life long atheist loved Carol's from Kings on the BBC on Christmas eve . I don't believe in any of it. I don't feel a need to fall to my knees and declare a sudden conversion . Its part of the culture here. Accept it or home school

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Absolutely this. Also agree with a pp who said it has zero impact on religious leanings later in life

I think a lot of people are missing your point (I only read first page of comments though)
There is a difference between being taught about religion, and being taught religion - I think this second one is your issue…
I am surprised to see so many PP say that hymns are still routinely sung of a morning in so many schools - I grew up with this in the 80s, but no state schools in my part of south London now have this, and I presumed this was just progress. Obviously, London is a more diverse populace, but I hadn’t realised it was not a more general thing.
i have been a bit shocked a couple of times at funerals to realise my DC don’t know any of the words to the hymns 🤦‍♀️

OP, I understand your dilemma.

I'm an atheist and went to a lovely Christian private school - we had prayers in the morning, said grace at lunch etc. I was fine with this because it was clear where the religion started/stopped and there was no pressure to engage in it just be quietly respectful of those who did. We had several Muslims in our school and they didn't have to say the prayers. Our religious lessons were quite balanced and explored lots of different viewpoints, apart from that, religion didn't feature much day-to-day.

In contrast, I don't like the religious element of my DCs school. In the name of diversity they actually don't say prayers or sing hymns but the religion is still there - its just more subtle. DC will mention occasionally about God or heaven, religious events are presented to them as historical fact. I feel there is much more indoctrination than what I experienced at school. Its harder to track what they are learning in this respect and therefore its more difficult to counter if I want to.

My strategy is just to make sure DCs tell me what they are learning. I've kept them off once when I didn't like the meaning behind a ceremony but otherwise its a case of telling DCs "some people believe this but I don't - you can make your own mind up when you're older".

Law in the UK is that schools include a daily act of worship. The national religion is Christianity, with the King as the head of the church.

Agree. Most uk schools have an element of religion, and if it’s got a saint in the name it’s pretty much guaranteed.

If you want secular you’ll need to locate a different school (probably a state one as all the privates I’ve seen have some element of religious instruction/observance involved.