British Humanist Asociation and church schools

What do people find so worrying about having all schools as community schools, funded equally per pupil, with a weighting maybe for areas of deprivation? If the status of schools was equal then all this faffing and anxiety about where your child goes to school would be reduced.

At the moment there is about a £3k difference in spend per pupil in LA schools depending on the education authority area, this makes a huge difference to staffing, maintenance and resourcing etc. It is not dependent on faith or non-faith!

City schools that benefitted from a huge injection of "city challenge" money now tend to outperform other similar schools that did not receive the funding. Money does make a difference but it is not the only thing.

e.g advertising in the Times Educational Supplement costs about £4k for a small advert. Many small schools do not have this at their disposal but some schools have full page ads!! The ability to recruit the best can cost!

granjura- juragran- didn't fool many did it?

As said, checked rules and etiquette- and providing a link to a Charity for fundraising is not included.

If anyone would like to make a donation, I am sure they will find the link to the BHA themselves.

And you changed your name, granjura - not by accident, as you have claimed in the past. Can't you just accept that your link was considered inappropriate by GNHQ?

Just checked and I am even more puzzled, Did my post include any of the following:

That said, we will remove posts we believe to be obscene, racist, contain personal attacks or break the law once they are brought to our attention.

Really?

Rules do include something about not being allowed to change name, very clearly stated, and yet it happens all the time, again and again. Goose and ganders?

Didn't notice that Moderators had deleted the link. Many have given links for donation to charities before I believe. Off to re-read the rules.

Touting?

Why ever not make people aware f the campaign and possibility to donate? I am not even a member of the BHA anyhow- but feel strongly about the Government trying to prevent them from exposing unfair and illegal pratctices- and decided to donate. Some here might feel the same.

I don't think touting for financial support is appropriate!

Message deleted by Gransnet for breaking our forum guidelines. Replies may also be deleted.

If you agree that trying to silence the British Humanism Association from exposing the truth- do try and make a donation to the campaign.

All children deserve excellent schools.

All the talk about faith schools are generally about cities. Most villages have C of E schools and they take everyone in the catchment area . There is no choice, rurally you may only have church schools in a 20 mile radius. In 1870 Education Act Board Schools filled in the gaps where there wasn't already a school.

varian - I am glad that you have grasped the point of the discussion. It is indeed an attack on civil liberties.

And is it proved that more funding for sink schools improves their performance educationally?
In which case, all sink schools can get out of being sink schools by mere money.

I dont get your points Elegran.
You are suggesting that faith schools have their funding from LAs descimated?

Exactly jingl- which is why it is best if they all go.

Elegran, agreed- But in villages there is usually only one school.

And whatever you do, the better off parents, the more influential, the better educated, etc- will always input into the schools their children attend even more funds, even better facilities, etc, through donations, fundraising, etc.

Where all children go to the local school, the above parents continue to support, donate, fundraise, etc, and not just their own children benefit- but all. ALL- children deserve excellent schools.

But yes, this thread is about the current Government stiffling and preventing information being shared with the population- and THAT is totally wrong, undemocratic and even dangerous.

This latest move by a Tory government to suppress legitimate complaints based on sound evidence is an appalling attack on civil liberty - something they would never have got away with when they were in coalition with the LibDems.

I hope that those who voted LibDem in 2010 and Tory in 2015 now realise their mistake!

Financial support for single faith schools in a multi-faith society could be cut without banning them totally. If someone wishes their child to go to one, the cost should be on the parents or the relevant church.

The other aspect is the one of inspection. If a school is officially licenced (and they all should be or they could be closed down) then it should be officially inspected, and not by inspectors appointed by the same people as run the school.

Improving the sink schools to be better than the faith schools could swing the balance the other way.

The money allocated from a local authority to a school whose name says that it is for those of a particular faith (they are supposed expected to take any or no faith, but the label and the focus remains) might have made a difference to the failing school across the road.

It would cause an awful lot of trouble, perhaps even with unwanted repercussions, if the government were to ban Muslim only schools.

...or even acceptable.....

The point of the research is not about the existence of faith schools, but about the government trying to squash free speech by suppressing the dissemination of research that shows unacceptable practices by these schools in their selection process.

We have debated before and aired our views on whether such schools should exist at all - this is about the important issue of the governent suppressing free speech. This cannot be aceptable.

And again and againe, some of us have tried to answer the question you and others have raised, quoted below:

Why would anyone want their child to attend a faith school so much if they did not want to go to church? confused - just puzzling.'

so I will repeat- because in some areas the choice is between a Church school and a 'sink' school. And because as Penstemmon has said several time, this is at times just a perception rather than a reality in educational terms- but is perceived as such for cultural, class, ethnic, etc reasons. Parents are prepared to bend their principles, and even get up to some incredible shananigans even fraud (I know this was disputed by some- but just a Google will show up 100s of articles showing this is indeed the case)... to get their children into what is, or is perceived to be - the 'best' school for their child- and if attending Church and getting kids baptised, etc, so be it!

In one area I knew very well- a suburb of the town where I lived, near the University - there were (still are) two primary schools. One Church school, the other not. One school had the vast majority of al the children from different ethnic background, most of those from the poorer housing and perhaps more 'difficult' families, and some of the Uni staff children- and faced true challenges not always easy to overcome- the other, the Church school, had all the other children from the 'better' homes and families (although many of those also attended the many private schools)- and the syllabus was (and probaby still is) geared to help with entrance exams for the private secondary schools. Later, due to this division, the more affluent Muslim families asked to open their own school, as they didn't want their children to go to what was perceived as a 'sink' school- nor a Church school with a strong Christian ethos/bias.

Actually, it is not me who has twisted and distorted.
The OP states church schools but the report states faith schools across the sector.
Now, that is a distortion of the intent of report is it not?

Why would anyone want their child to attend a faith school so much if they did not want to go to church? - just puzzling.

Again and again? I only posted twice, once to clarify the OP, the second to question the ethos of the HA which appears to be full of joy and care for others.
You can correct my impressions of the HA sensibly and rationally, surely, without being silly and making assumptions about my faith, lack of it, my support for faith schools - or lack of it. Actually you obviously misread what I posted on the other thread because I said I was not in favour faith schools.
But neither am I in favour of minorities trying to impose their views on others who are happy with the status quo.

Carry on with your campaigning.

been going on for years!

Isn't it odd that when someone points out that evidence has been obtained showing some schools to be using underhand and discriminatory admissions practices, that there is an accusation of "belligerence".

Are the many religious people who raise concerns about faith schools also "belligerent" or opposed to the idea of "live and let live". The Fair Admissions Campaign quotes Rabbi Dr Jonathan Romain MBE, Minister of Maidenhead Synagogue and Chair of the Accord Coalition for Inclusive Education:

"I want my children to go to a school where they can sit next to a Christian, play football at break time with a Muslim, do homework with a Hindu and walk home with an atheist – and with other children getting to know what a Jewish child is like. Schools should build bridges, not erect barriers."

The FAC has also reported:

"Following a report published by the Fair Admissions Campaign (FAC) last year revealing that almost every religiously-selective school in England is breaking the law, the Education Secretary has announced she now plans to ban groups and organisations from officially raising concerns about the admission arrangements of schools. In a thinly veiled attack on FAC and the British Humanist Association (BHA), which produced the report on behalf of FAC, the ban, which was first suggested by a variety of religious organisations in a meeting with Department for Education (DfE) officials last year, is specifically targeted at ‘secular campaign groups’, according to Nicky Morgan. FAC has described the proposal as an ‘affront to both democracy and the rule of law’, stating that it will allow religiously selective schools to continue abusing the system and unfairly discriminate against a huge number of children in the process."