Nick Clegg on faith schools
Written by Mark Pack on 30th December 2007 – 8:55 amFrom an interview given this week to The Jewish News:
If we are to create a society in which everyone has a fair chance in life, we need to focus on education, above all. Faith schools have an important role to play in that, and I am keen that they become engines of integration, not of segregation. I would like to see faith schools working together, so you get a network of different schools and faiths. That way children will grow up in an environment where they are aware of the plurality of faiths and views around them.
The interview also covers topics such as tackling antisemitism and the Middle East peace process. You can read the rest of the interview here.
Posted in News
30th December 2007 at 10:50 am
I am a little puzzled here.
Nick says “he does not do God” Yet here he is advocating faith schools which are very much designed to do God
Personally I have have grave concerns of advocating more faith schools. The argument that because they already exist more should be allowed is to me a false premise on which to determine whether more faith schools will help create a more cohesive community
Surely schools should focus on giving our young people skills to cope in an increasingly competitive global world.
Faith schools by their very nature are insular and focus on the community - religious or ethnic - it serves and is less concerned about its relations to the wider community.
The suggestion that by encouraging faith schools to forge links with other schools we will create a society that is more understanding and tolerant of the diverse cultures is a false hope.
There is a place for faith groups - but it is not faith schools - it could be after schools clubs - sunday / friday schools in churches, temples, mosques, synagogues etc.
Schools should be a secular place - much as the country is where we teach children to grow up learning that all of them have the same rights, responsibilites and opportunities regardless of their faith.
30th December 2007 at 11:09 am
Personally, I’d prefer my children to to go a reason-based school.
30th December 2007 at 11:44 am
A “reason-based school”??? You must be one of those atheist fundamentalists.
30th December 2007 at 12:10 pm
I think faith schools are very important. I went to a militantly religious school and it turned me into the atheist I am today!
30th December 2007 at 12:11 pm
@1:
“I am a little puzzled here.
Nick says “he does not do God” Yet here he is advocating faith schools which are very much designed to do God”
That would be liberalism, non?
30th December 2007 at 12:22 pm
That would be liberalism, non?
What a pity that liberalism has to entail a betrayal of our children.
30th December 2007 at 1:01 pm
2 and 3 - Well, not exactly a fundamentalist, Laurence - while my local primary is a CofE school, I would prefer a secular one, and I am prepared to say so publicly, I’m not millitant enough to blow it up. Or even, since I will be able to walk to the CofE one, and consider the environmental aspects important too, to travel the extra miles to the nearest secular provision. Indeed, it seems to me that much of the stuff about choice in education is pointless to most people since they use their local schools. But I will keep an eye on what my children are being taught, and would appreciate advice from more experienced parents in a similar position.
30th December 2007 at 1:35 pm
Clegg is looking weak here. On the balance of probabilities he says he doesn’t believe that a god(s) exist, but is bringing his children up as Catholics and thinks that faith schools have an important role in education. I’d prefer an affirmed theist leader, who realised that secularism doesn’t mean anti-religious.
30th December 2007 at 2:19 pm
“What a pity that liberalism has to entail a betrayal of our children”
Those are not the words of a rationalist setting forth a reasoned argument (no, of course not, Alix, they’re the words of Laurence
).
I’m not sure I agree with Paul P that Clegg’s position is untenable. The sad fact is that this is a subject where rationalism and liberalism in concert do not provide one answer. If you ban faith schools from the state, you are restricting the freedom of the less wealthy religious to send their children to a faith school. If you encourage them, you restrict the converse freedom in the less wealthy non-religious, as well as creating potential isolation and all manner of social evils that flow from that. This last problem is what Clegg is tackling in talking about using faith schools to further integration. There’s no reason I can see why that shouldn’t work. But you’re right in that it doesn’t solve the essential should-we-shouldn’t-we problem.
I’m not sure Clegg has achieved balance on this in his own mind any more than I have, but this comment thread is already demonstrating how people can reach wildly different conclusions on allegedly the same principles. And will probably continue to do so long into the night. There isn’t an easy answer, much as militant atheists would like to make out there is by repeatedly stating their argument in bombastic terms.
30th December 2007 at 2:21 pm
Alix, whose education are we talking about? The parent’s or the child’s?
30th December 2007 at 2:22 pm
If you follow that argument to its logical conclusion, you would take away children at birth and rear them in isolation tanks.
30th December 2007 at 2:25 pm
I don’t want to take the argument to its logical conclusion. But it would certainly be good to see Liberal Democrats developing a philosophy of the rights of children which might include measures to protect them from being burdened unduly by the ignorance of the past.
30th December 2007 at 3:27 pm
Faith schools in the US (private of course) are a warning of where we’ll end up in the UK if we promote these pernicious institutions any further. Nick Clegg certainly looks weak on this topic - perhaps it’s just as well it’s not one which the voters will concentrate on….
30th December 2007 at 3:32 pm
You say weak, I say tolerant. He doesn’t believe in God, but he respects other people’s freedom to believe.
If strength means forcing your views on others (you believe in God? sorry, close that school now - and never open another one), then that gives strength a rather bad name.
Being liberal doesn’t mean you ban anyone who disagrees with you. It means respecting other people’s views and choices.
30th December 2007 at 3:35 pm
How very disappointing it is that any Liberal, whether believing in imaginary friends or not ( as Nick Clegg claims), should support the existence of imaginary friend schools.
Children should definitely not be fed a diet of nonsense as part of their education. Instead, they should be protected from the child abuse that is religious instruction.
Perhaps the pro- faith schoolers believe they actually own their children. Let’s not forget that wonderful religion Islam, which tells us that apostates should be killed.
30th December 2007 at 3:38 pm
Not very liberal are you Colin? If you were really a liberal, you’d believe in tolerance - but you clearly hate pepole who disagree with you, even verging on accussing each and every Muslim of being a murderer. That’s not tolerant. That’s not liberal. That’s nasty and extreme.
30th December 2007 at 3:38 pm
But we’re not talking about people’s freedom to believe. We’re talking about people’s freedom to indoctrinate. Ought we maybe to extend this freedom to other forms of child abuse?
30th December 2007 at 3:45 pm
Like Nick I don’t believe in God, and unlike Nick I actually probably would never send children of mine to a religious school, but I still think that if parents want to send their children to a religious school, then fine.
I think that schools should be run by as wide a range of providers as possible - from local councils, charities, NGOs, and, yes, religious groups. And yes, I think that parents who want a particular provider should be able to get state funding towards their child’s education.. I can’t see how it’s liberal to insist on a state controlled monopoly to protect the state’s schools.
I understand the concerns people have about faith schools (which is why I don’t like them myself), but if parents want to bring their children up in a faith then they’re going to do so. I wouldn’t myself, but I have many friends who are Christian, Muslim and Sikh and they don’t seem irreparably damaged goods. Better they get an excellent education rather than having their parents still bring them up in a religion and end up with a poor education at the end of it.
Ultimately the liberal issue is of course that no parents can force their children to actually believe something - if they are athiest at the age of 12 or whatever after growing up in a faith school, then so be it.
30th December 2007 at 3:46 pm
. . . even verging on accusing each and every Muslim of being a murderer.
Well we can all see that Colin didn’t say that. He said that Islam teaches that apostates should be killed. And of course he’s right. That is what Islam teaches.
It is Islam which is nasty and extreme, and far from “respecting” it, liberals should be attacking this poisonous ideology head on.
30th December 2007 at 3:48 pm
No 16, it is the religious who are intolerant. No Liberal would deny anyone the right to believe in imaginary friends, leprechauns, homeopathy, fairies at the bottom of the garden, crystal healing or UFO abduction.
What ALL Liberals should be intolerant of is when people have no choice in what they believe, and when states give priveleges to religion. Faith schools are just one such privelege.
30th December 2007 at 7:50 pm
Gosh, don’t we all get terribly worked up on this?
I’m a firm agnostic (yes, I’ve noticed the inherent contradiction there), yet I’ve no huge problem with schools which have a faith-based ethos subject to a number of provisos:
1. they should operate WITHIN an essentially secular public structure;
2. they should respect the legal mores (you know what I mean) of the wider community (i.e. non-racist, non homophobic etc);
3. they should not “indoctrinate”, which is something very different from observing a faith-based philosophy;
4. they should not recruit or discriminate on basis of faith of families.
To listen to some of the firmer anti-faith school elements on here you would think every such establishment is staffed entirely by child-abusing Jesuits or mad mullahs.
The vast majority of those involved in such schools are simply trying to help children, with a motivation coloured (strengthened?) by their religious convictions. I do not share their convictions, but I respect and admire their commitment to a wider society.
Is that illiberal ????
30th December 2007 at 7:56 pm
I feel a little bit uncomfortable writing this post, since my inclination as a Lib Dem member is to support my leader. Sadly, I am unable to offer much comfort to Nick in this instance.
What Nick wrote on that Jewish website is a typical piece of Nick waffle: attempting to appeal to everyone without saying anything very concrete, yet ending up offending about everyone.
State-funded “faith” schools exist primarily because the Labour Party, as long ago as the 1930s, made a Mephistopholean pact with the RC Church: church schools in return for votes. A segregated system already existed in Scotland and Northern Ireland. The comprehensive reorganisation of the 1960s and 1970s enabled Labour to deliver it in England too.
So, having allowed the Roman Catholics to have their own education system funded by the state, it is rather difficult to deny the same facility to Moslems, Jews, Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Pagans, or whomever.
The Roman Catholics will fight like tigers to keep their privileges. Posts such as mine will be met with cries of religious persecution, and any politician who stands up to them is likely to suffer at the ballot-box (Evan Harris watch your back).
Every time the late Bob Mellish was interviewed on the radio he managed to get in somewhere that he was a “devout” Roman Catholic and he would fight tooth and nail to keep Catholic schools. Like David Alton, Mellish was in Parliament to represent the Church, not his constituents - or at least that is how it appeared sometimes. In the face of this kind of thing it is easy to see why politicians are so craven.
The whole worrisome issue has taken on an added piquancy now that it seems that the ultramontaine tendency is in control of the RC Church in England. See the post below:
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,2233421,00.html
Why should my taxes be used to pay priests to feed this garbage to children?
Again, I am sorry to have to say this, but Nick’s admission that his children are being brought up as Roman Catholics is a sign of weakness. If he cannot prevail against his own wife, what chance does he have against Cheney?
30th December 2007 at 8:24 pm
Hmmm.
I care little about whether a school is religious or not. Only whether it does it job. The only fanaticism appears to be a problem with one or two islamic schools.
Faith schools are an easy target. Why don’t people attack the lousy state schools, where violence - including appalling homophobia - are the norm?
Since when do faith school produce insular people? Our sink state shools produce people who cannot read or write. That’s the issue.
Our education system is a disaster; the faith schools are the only option for those who can’t afford private fees.
But that does not bother those who attack faith schools; they, after all, are usually hypocrites who ensure their children quietly go to the very best - usually private or, yes, faith schools.
When the critics of faith schools wade into state schools and deal with the violent thugs who could knife you even if they think you are gay, or if you want to learn - that’s when I’ll take you seriously.
But no, you’ll pick on the easy targets and to hell with the others. Just chavs, eh?
30th December 2007 at 8:31 pm
As a party which advocates fairness, I hope we want to extend that to the education system.
Is it fair that some people should have a better access to a state funded school because of the religion of their parents? Is it fair that some people should have better access to state funded jobs as teachers because of their religion?
Is it fair that non religious parents in many parts of the country have no reasonable choice but to send their children to the local faith primary school?
State funded faith schools simply distort equal access and fairness in the education system. They lead to the nonsense of parents puffing up their religious credentials simply in order to get their children into a particular school.
Our Liberal principles should lead us to ensuring that all people have an equal right of access to education. We are against selection on ability, so we should be against selection on faith.
30th December 2007 at 8:45 pm
If party members genuinely believed against selection by faith or ability, then how is it we don’t have legions of party members sending their children to the local state school?
Could it be becuase there is too much of a chance the local stance is a crap one, full of violence and illiteracy?
The fact the debate is about faith schools, rather than state school standards - or all schools standards - simply tells us that party members have little experience in this. Possibly becuase members can afford to send their kids to the best, whilst hypocritically preaching something else - applicable to other people’s children, of course.
30th December 2007 at 8:45 pm
local school, that should read above…
30th December 2007 at 9:27 pm
Faith schools are an easy target. Why don’t people attack the lousy state schools, where violence - including appalling homophobia - are the norm?
Possibly because those schools need to be helped, not attacked?
Our education system is a disaster; the faith schools are the only option for those who can’t afford private fees.
And you think there is no overall cost to faith schooling? When it comes to faith schools, there really is such a thing as a free lunch?
When the critics of faith schools wade into state schools and deal with the violent thugs who could knife you even if they think you are gay . . .
Ah, so there is a cost . . .
Possibly because members can afford to send their kids to the best, whilst hypocritically preaching something else . . .
Well you’ve got a point there. Anyone who can afford the £9 membership fee must be rolling in it.
30th December 2007 at 10:42 pm
“Possibly because those schools need to be helped, not attacked?”
So, why aren’t you ‘helping’them then? Why are we talking about faith schools, when so many children life chances are being wiped out by crap schooling in state ones? (which of course we find in some faith schools too?)
“And you think there is no overall cost to faith schooling? When it comes to faith schools, there really is such a thing as a free lunch?”
They are rather better vaule for money for than state ones, who produce unemployable people who go into low paid jobs, benefits or prison. What’s the cost of that to those people?
But its evident that’s a cost that you aren’t paying.
“Ah, so there is a cost . . .”
Glib answer, perhaps you don’t think such shools are real? Wrong areas, no doubt.
“Well you’ve got a point there. Anyone who can afford the £9 membership fee must be rolling in it.”
The party is a middle class one. I’ve come accross a number of Lib dem parents. None send their offspring to the local state school. But they would no doubt insist they ‘really’ believe in them, but only for other people’s kids (i.e. people on estates).
30th December 2007 at 11:00 pm
why bother to debate with Tories stupid enough to make comments like this @28:
They are rather better vaule(sic) for money for(sic) than state ones, who produce unemployable people who go into low paid jobs, benefits or prison. What’s the cost of that to those people?
Judging by the level of literacy displayed here, I’d say private schooling didn’t do much good in this case.
30th December 2007 at 11:13 pm
Thank you colinW.
I apologise for my illiteracy. I just fire these things off. But then, you see, I went to a crap state school. Violence, low standards, all that stuff people like you approve of - providing only others suffer it.
But the good news is, I wasn’t indoctrinated by any priests into believing in mystical things such as “literacy”.
Oh, and I’m a lib dem of many years standing.
cue “no you are not”, “tory” blah blah blah
30th December 2007 at 11:14 pm
So, why aren’t you helping them then?
Me? Well I wouldn’t know how to. And besides I’m working flat out at the moment to hurt religion.
Why are we talking about faith schools, when so many children’s life chances are being wiped out by crap schooling in state ones?
Er . . . because we are. Because faith schooling as an issue is independent of overall educational quality. First there’s the question of fairness as Richard Church pointed out in his excellent post, and then there’s the dubious wisdom of teaching common falsehoods to our children.
[Faith schools] are rather better value for money for than state ones, who produce unemployable people who go into low paid jobs, benefits or prison.
Why can’t you see that if that sweeping generalisation were true to any extent, then it would be an argument against faith schools which are clearly benefiting unfairly at the expense of the others?
I’ve come across a number of Lib Dem parents. None send their offspring to the local state school.
Why should they? I would privately educate my children if I could afford it, but sadly I have neither money nor children.
30th December 2007 at 11:19 pm
I thought the Lib Dems did not believe in faith school?
When did this change of policy happen?
30th December 2007 at 11:32 pm
I’m with Sid on this one. As a parent whose 3 children went to and still go to state schools,including a secondary school not deemed good enough for so-called ‘left winger’, Diane Abbotts son, I think we miss the point when we get so hung up about faith schools. The point for me is that we do not live in a secular country, and from my own years in a state school, where the only mandatory lessons were RE (read Christianity for all), if you have CoE or Catholic schools, then you cannot exclude other faith schools. This is the reality. I would defy any politician from any party, particularly those seeking power, to put in their manifesto they would scrap all faith schools. Its never gonna happen. So lets look at why why generations of children have been failed by the education system that has allowed what Alistair Campbell so charmingly called ‘bog standard secondary schools’ The rich will always be able to buy their way out, either into the private sector, or simply move near the best state of faith schools. This leaves many children with little choice but to remain in sink schools.
As for the point about Nick Cleggs own kids being brought up as Catholics: That is a matter for him and his wife.
30th December 2007 at 11:36 pm
ah… Laurence, I see your point is more ideological. Ok. My concern is best education. Faith schools tend to provide a better education. Plenty of exceptions, but that tends to be the case.
Hence, it could thus be said that state schools are benefiting unfairly at the expense of faith ones?
If it were the other way around, I would be saying faith schools were not up to it.
We’ve had faith schools for years; we do not see armies of Christian fundamentalists in the streets.
We do, however, see a lot of violent kids on the streets - and a majority I am sure will have gone to state schools. For them, ‘reason’ often has no meaning.
30th December 2007 at 11:51 pm
My fundamental point is that in teaching falsehood to our children, we are at once betraying them and undermining the entire project of learning.
30th December 2007 at 11:58 pm
As for the point about Nick Clegg’s own kids being brought up as Catholics, that is a matter for him and his wife.
Too bad then that he introduced the subject himself while attempting to back-pedal from the shocking revelation that he is an atheist. Now the issue is fair game.
31st December 2007 at 12:02 am
Meral
Your experience is important, I hope party members think upon it.
Sid
31st December 2007 at 12:35 am
The issue here is not so much the relative educational malevolence which different types of religious schools or non-denominational offer . Rather it is the inevitable wedge that faith-based schools drive between communities. The dangers of which are obvious by any inspection of Northern Ireland where attempts to break-down inter-communal problems are significantly undermined by the institutional social divisions caused by religious schooling.
As liberals - as a fundamental prinicple - we should surely be defending pluralistic education which exposes children to the fullest possible range of religious and cultural traditions and hence enables them to chose an identity based on their personal thought and judgement rather than communal identity.
31st December 2007 at 12:50 am
But Douglas, Northern Ireleand is rather different situation. The argument there is/was about what country it is.
We’ve had faith schools for a long time now on the mainland, and it has created no such problems at all. Sectarian strife is rather limited - a bit in Scotland, really.
31st December 2007 at 12:51 am
bravo to #35.
31st December 2007 at 1:39 am
Sid, faith schools are allowed to be selective on whom they take and it just so happens they take less children eligible for free schools meals than non-religious school and more children with ambitious parents. It is hardly surprising then that they get better results.
Surely a school that educates children on the wide range of beliefs found in our pluralist society and invites them to draw their own conclusions on religious matters is more likely to produce more inquisitive, independent and self-controlled individuals?
31st December 2007 at 2:14 am
Paul
Well, not really, no. Faith schools turn out more inquisitive, independent, self-controlled kids than the state sector (on the whole) Just need to see kids on public transport to see that.
And faith school are hardly the fundamentalist establishments people think. Is our country crawling with catholic and protestant extremists due to decades of church schools? er, no.
Ethos is the big difference. Discipline, methods of teaching etc. tend to be different in faith shools. Hence the fight to get into those schools.
A fight that indeed does benefit people who are better off. Often people who then pronounce on the joys of the state sector for others.
And therein lies the problem. The system benefits those opposed to selection, because that means less competition from smart kids from estates, whose parents do not have the contacts, no matter how motivated they may be.
Our society has become less socially mobile. Nothing to do with faith schools - the abolition of which will simply make worse.
31st December 2007 at 2:24 am
Sid, how would you feel if you had a good school on the doorstep, but your children were forced instead to travel a long distance to school because they didn’t match the religious criteria? They’re basically barred from attending an ideal school that you are paying for. Why? Because of ancient mythology.
31st December 2007 at 2:52 am
rather annoyed! However, it is not true that faith schools choose completely on such criteria. They do actually have children of other faiths or none.
however, that is not the real issue facing communities. A far more likely scenario is having a sink sate school (and indeed the occassional faith one)on your doorstep, and not being able to afford sending your child a long way to go to a decent school.
That is the real problem people face.
We see the results in our society today; so many kids so badly educated that we have to get in poles to do their work. That includes nurses, doctors etc - not just the low paid stuff.
31st December 2007 at 3:02 am
They do actually have children of other faiths or none.
Well yes but it has to be a small minority or it wouldn’t be a faith school any more of whatever faith it is supposed to be. And as Richard pointed out above, it’s the same story for the teachers. Madness.
31st December 2007 at 5:56 am
Alix @#9 (hope you’re still reading): “If you ban faith schools from the state, you are restricting the freedom of the less wealthy religious to send their children to a faith school.”
No you’re not. If churches, mosques, etc, want to indoctrinate, er, I mean educate children, they can have Sunday School, surely?
I would LOVE to see a politician stand up and say they are going to scrap state funding for faith schools. ALL faith schools. I find it very depressing that most of us seem to accept that this is never going to happen.
31st December 2007 at 9:58 am
It is disappointing to see that our new leader is still waffling! It was excusable during the leadership campaign where it might be seen as wishing to avoid conflict with his rival/colleague. But now he should be very clear in his views. I’ve also received a New Year’s message from Nick which is very long and waffly. “I don’t want to live in a country where….. etc.”
But on the subject, Faith schools, we should be firm; where the state picks up the bill it can surely insist that single faith teaching is separated from curriculum teaching and is optional for all pupils according to their parents wishes.
And that all state funded schools provide teaching in the different religions of the world as part of the curriculum.
My own experience is that the family influence will matter most. I sent my son to a C of E school because, as an atheist, I wanted him to have the opportunity to take the christian message from those who believe it. But after one year, at age six, he would ask me questions about it from the angle of, “But what do you believe” . I would respond with a simple account of evolution, and he decided that this was easier than god.
In defence of Nick on one point, I understand that in mixed Catholic marriages the parties have to agree to bring up any children in the catholic faith.
Elizabeth
31st December 2007 at 10:00 am
Merals experience is important and her point is spot on. No party who seeks power will advocate abolishing faith schools
Nick probably is waffling a bit as he is treading a fine line but as far as I am concerned he has got it about right
As for those who think Nick should ride roughshod over the views of his wife which planet do you live on
31st December 2007 at 10:07 am
Sid, as you say at 44, the real problem to solve is have a ’sink’ school on your doorstep. Faith schools though are an obstacle to that solving problem, not a solution.
Faith is used as an excuse for parents to get their children away from that school. They suddenly turn up at church on Sunday and discover god. Belive me it happens! The sink school sinks even further as kids with less motivated parents remain.
Nick Clegg’s ‘pupil premium’ is part of the answer, another is to remove any state funded school’s right to select pupils or teachers on the basis of religion.
Simple, straight forward, non discriminatory liberalism.
31st December 2007 at 10:55 am
60% of the pupils at my daughter’s Catholic school are from other faiths or none, the school act as both a faith school and a neighbourhood school for a very deprived ward (I know I’m their councillor). No one’s taxes subsides the ‘faith’ element of faith schools, if anything the church subsidises state education.
I have wish to impose my beliefs on anyone else or their children; I want my children brought up in my faith as is my right under the European Convention of Human Rights and the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights; it is the only way they will be able to make an informed choice as adults. The only reason for abolishing faith schools is a backdoor attempt to deprive me of my human rights it seems.
31st December 2007 at 1:45 pm
50. David - how does indoctrinating your children with ancient mythology equip them to make informed decisions on faith as adults???
And you admit that you have a wish to impose your beliefs on other people!!!
Not very liberal, I’d've thought…
31st December 2007 at 2:00 pm
I really don’t recognise Sid’s description of the Party as being one of middle class people who largely use selective education, and I am certain that a large majority of party members have direct experience of state education.
Having been thinking about my own education recently in comparison to that of my younger daughter, my ‘O’ level class had 35 pupils - far too large according to educational dogma, but in fact no problem at all because I was at a Grammar School and pupils who were disruptive could be slung out. My daughter’s education, at a comprehensive, was blighted by classes being disrupted by people who didn’t want to be there, and an anti-education ethos that pervaded the whole system.
As someone in the thread has observed, one of the reasons that faith-based schools do better is that they have greater sanctions with regard to pupils who are disruptive, thus allowing the ones who do want to work to get on with it. Now, I am in no way wanting to write off the kids for whom education as it stands is a waste of time. My daughter had good friends in her class who it was clear from day one at secondary school were going to achieve nothing at the end of five years, and that is a failure of our educational system, not a failure of the kids. That is why it is so tragic that the government dismissed the proposals of the Tomlinson Report, and I am proud of the Party for supporting Tomlinson. If we take Tomlinson as a basis for the future of secondary education then perhaps what we need is more selection rather than none. If we have a much greater plurality in the type of educational provision then the chances of giving a genuine education to a high proportion of pupils should be improved. Having been partly educated at a Quaker influenced school, which did not prevent me from becoming an atheist, I feel that as long as provision of education becomes much more pluralist than it is now, and as long as the essential principles of pluralism are upheld within each school then having a faith basis in some schools should not be too much of a problem.
31st December 2007 at 2:46 pm
A very interesting thread.
I have to say No 24 advances yet another reason why the Party was right to reject faith schools at conference a few years back.
Yasmin is right - this decsion has not yet been reversed
Mike - I accept that faith schools that already exist cannot be shut down - nor their funding altered.
I still contend that that is no reason to advocate new faith schools.
As so many of the contributors have said we should be concerned with promoting a high standard of general education and ensuring ndviduals from all backgrounds - rich,poor,black,white - have equal access to the same high standard of education
Incidentally I thought Liberal Democrats were against selection . the starting pont for faith schools is whether you meet the “faith criteria” So how do those of you who advocate faith schools square that circle?
31st December 2007 at 2:56 pm
I’m with Dawkins on this one - there aren’t such things as Christian kids, Muslim kids etc - only children of parents who believe in a Christian God, a Muslim God etc. However is inevitable that a lot parents will want to indoctrinate their belief system into their kids. So if such religious people want to set up schools and isolate themselves and their kids from the wider community then let them.
Yet I don’t see why I as a taxpayer should have to pay for it. The state should never fund such schools. Otherwise are we going to have state funded Scientologist Schools etc?
As for the state of comprehensives etc - yes there is a lot of room for improvement and I can understand why those who are fairly indifferent to religion want to send their kids to religious schools if the only key reason is that they have better teaching if it is based on the academic results.
However this does detract from those above like myself questioning why we tolerate state-funded religious schools which are based on texts which are clearly not tolerate on other faiths and non-believers.
31st December 2007 at 3:18 pm
54. Way to go, GaffaUK! Exactly!!
31st December 2007 at 4:18 pm
53 Felix that should be “I have no wish to impose my beliefs…”.
I think my children will be able to look objectively at Catholicism (good and bad), and not be influenced by people who dismissively condemn it as ancient mythology.
Democracy has ancient roots too. Pax Vobiscum
31st December 2007 at 4:40 pm
no.52, Tony. Just to clarify myself, I would think that many party members do have experience of state education, but many are able to get into the better ones.
We don’t really see senior party people saying their children go to the local sink school, which is an experience far too many people in our country have to go through. If they did, the party’s thinking would be very different.
However, I think you are on the right track with selection and so on. Kids do better with peers, and those who are not interested in learning need to be placed somewhere which can deal with their problems, and provide them with a decent future.
31st December 2007 at 4:53 pm
GaffaUK- the reality is you are far more likely to get tolerant children from a faith school, then a state one. Check out the violent kids. Check out the violent homophobic attitudes in state schools.
And as I keep asking: Where are these legions of intolerant people that faith schools supposedly produce? where are they hiding, all these decades? we are talking a few million people.
instead of bashing faith schools, those who oppsose them should really be looking in their own back yard, before criticising others.
31st December 2007 at 5:01 pm
Show me the facts Sid that you are more likely to get tolerant children from a faith school. What do you base this on?
31st December 2007 at 5:29 pm
GaffaUK; its no secret that faith schools overall do better than state ones. No secret also, that state schools turn out more disaffected kids - for whom tolerence is an unknown word.
More to the point, could you demonstrate those millions of intolerent people who went to faith schools?
Where are they exactly?
31st December 2007 at 5:49 pm
If it’s no secret then show me the facts to back up your claim as I would be interested to see those figures. I’m not disputing your claim just want to see your claims backed up.
And as you can see above I have not claimed that there are millions (or even anyone) of intolerant people who went to faith school. I said “based on texts which are clearly not tolerate on other faiths and non-believers”. Do you want me to post quotes from the Bible which are tolerant of other faiths and non-believers?
31st December 2007 at 6:12 pm
A very brief look thru google brings up two telegraph pieces, first more factual on primaries, the second a comment referring to secondary schools which refers to a survey on the matter:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=3YZNFTBGZ35Z5QFIQMGCFFOAVCBQUIV0?xml=/news/2006/12/07/nschools07.xml
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/12/06/nedu306.xml
Now, I think some will rightly point out that the better off/motivated gravitate here. That’s because faith schools have better techniques, which many state schools do not wish to apply - or prevented from doing.
No matter how motivated a chid’s parent are, if they end up in a bad school, they will do badly, no matter how smart the kid is. I know, seen it with my own eyes.
Hence the middle class flight to the best school, using all their connections, whilst praising the state sector, non-selection for other people’s childrens.
We need to get to grips with the collapse in edcucatin. Nick’s ideas may help, but we must be far more radical.
31st December 2007 at 6:14 pm
ha! in my typo ridden piece, I did mean “education”. My state education showing again!
31st December 2007 at 6:24 pm
lol - you hit the nail on the head there Sid. Such faith schools are open up to criticism of selection and having middle class parents getting their kids into such schools which then raising them even further - or was such a jump from 44% to 60% divine?;)
I can’t believe that the main reason that faith schools do better is just because they teach a particular faith.
In the same way Private schools do better academically because they select, attract middle classes (because those on less cannot afford the fees) and the have better resources. Therefore do we scrap all state education and have all our schools as private and fee-paying because academically they do better?
I think the answer is to improve state schools and allow faith schools to exist but not state-funded. Unless state schools have equal selection methods (which are dubious at best - as where do those who don’t measure get dumped) and resources then comparisons aren’t applicable.
So next - violent homophobic attitudes in state schools - which Telegraph (!) web article did you get this from?;)
31st December 2007 at 6:51 pm
Violent homophobia: Seen with my own eyes. If you are unaware of that sub-culture,and dismiss it some telegrap thing, then I am sorry but you are leading a very sheltered life.
Perhaps you recall the Damilola Taylor case? He was the subject of homophobic bullying at his school, which no-one did anything about. Sure, you will get this at church schools, but its more prevalent in state ones.
Faith schools do not do better because they teach faith. They do better because of ethos: respect for learning, discipline and so on.
The upper middle class flight to such schools has been going for some time. State schools changed teaching methods, years back. Many faith schools did not.
We see the results in society today. Observe politics; we laugh about the similarity between between the education between Cameron, Clegg and Huhne and their backgrounds and so on.
Not so long ago, people with modest backgrounds were able to achieve the highest office in politics via state schools. Now, it is near impossible.
And that is nothing to do with faith schools, and everything to do with teaching methods and so on.
31st December 2007 at 7:05 pm
David at 50. You want a right to educate your child in your faith but acknowledge that 60% of the chidren at your daughter’s RC school are of other religions or none. What rights do they have?
You describe it as a neighbourhood school, but if people want their right to a non religious education for their chidren in their neighbourhood, they are denied it.
The right of a child to be educated in a neighbourhood school, regardless of faith, is denied by state faith schools.
31st December 2007 at 7:20 pm
The only reason for abolishing faith schools is a backdoor attempt to deprive me of my human rights it seems.
No, it is a front door attempt to defend the rights of the child.
I think my children will be able to look objectively at Catholicism . . .
If they look objectively at Catholicism, then they will reject it. In order to accept Catholicism, you gotta have “faith.”
. . . the Party was right to reject faith schools at conference a few years back.
I’d like to know more about this. What year was this, and is there any online material available?
31st December 2007 at 7:41 pm
Sid - as you say yourself - I’m sure homophobic bullying happens in faith schools but I (and I suspect you) don’t know which is more prevalent. If a school is in a ‘rough’ area with poor academic record and discipline then I would imagine then there would be more bullying generally.
However to choose to send a child to a faith school then the likelihood is that religion (and it turn the school) itself will be homophobic in that it views homosexuality as a sin - so any schoolkid who may think they are gay won’t be able to talk to their teachers!
31st December 2007 at 8:16 pm
First of all, I would like to clarify what I said in post 22:
“Why should my taxes be used to pay priests to feed this garbage to children?”
I may have given the impression that I regard ALL Roman Catholic beliefs as “garbage”. That is not the case. I was actually referring to the RC Bishop of Lancaster’s call to Catholic schools in his diocese not to teach children to practice safe sex. That is “garbage”, in fact very dangerous and pernicious “garbage”, as it Mr O’Donoghue’s justification. That story is in the link provided. Not immediately obvious to readers, so sorry!
Sid is concerned about the issue of sink schools, as indeed we all should be. Sadly, isolating motivated students in a few good schools won’t solve the problem. The biggest cause of poor school discipline is the school leaving age, presently set at 16 and due to be extended to 18 by Brown. If we put it back to 14 (where it was prior to 1944), school discipline would improve markedly.
When David talks about his human right to send his children to a segregated Roman Catholic school, he is talking about his own right, not those of his children. What about the right of his children not to be told that if they disobey the Church they will go to hell and burn for eternity? Or not to be told that the use of a condom is a mortal sin?
Unless, of course, David concurs with John Patten MP, the former Tory education minister who said that fear of hellfire is essential to the maintenance of order.
1st January 2008 at 12:23 am
Therefore do we scrap all state education and have all our schools as private and fee-paying because academically they do better?
Now we’re getting somewhere!
(Only half in jest!)
1st January 2008 at 12:24 am
If there are enough adherents on the next census by the way, can we campaign for a Jedi school, please. I’m sure there’s a few thousand votes in that!
1st January 2008 at 1:15 am
It’s a bit sad when you think about it. Children attending fee-paying schools today are probably getting roughly the same standard of education that they would have had for free at the grammar schools of old. But selection on academic merit was deemed politically unacceptable, so the state has now become the exclusive purveyor of crap education. And yet one method of selection was retained, based insanely on religious criteria. Why? Because our politicians are basically vote-whores. There are days when I think that democracy is a really bad idea.
Hmm, sorry to start off 2008 on such a sour note!
1st January 2008 at 1:39 am
What’s wrong with selection within schools rather than between schools? Surely the old split between Grammar and Secondary Moderns decades ago shows how this was divisive when kids were assessed at the age 11?
I agree with streaming but within schools - as this makes it easier to move within streams (rather than change schools which is unlikely) rather than having certain priveleged schools creaming off the better educated kids.
1st January 2008 at 2:31 am
Because the smart kids get bullied by the thickos. Or at least that’s what happened to me!
1st January 2008 at 10:30 am
*Thinks she must put up a fight for state education for the millionth time then decides she can’t be be a**ed*
1st January 2008 at 12:03 pm
So there are just the smart kids and the thickos? Sounds like the Eloi and the Morlocks - maybe we should judge kids at nursery school, seperate them there and have done with? *sigh*
1st January 2008 at 3:35 pm
The experience in Hackney is that faith schools do a very good job in academic acheivement. Although far from perfect, community relations in Hackney are generally good.
I think we need to differentiate between good faith schools and bad ones. Obviously there are concerns about people becoming extremists, and schools that encourage that should not be permitted. Other schools however teach a moderate version of their faith, and the effects in doing so could be more beneficial than if that child goes to a secular school.
1st January 2008 at 3:44 pm
If we continue rolling out and funding faith schools then I worry we will be closer to becoming like Northern Ireland was/is where communities are divided by religion in particualar what schools they go to and where children do not learn from other of different religions because they are kept apart.
1st January 2008 at 5:50 pm
the old grammar/secondary modern worked better in educating people overall, but I would rather do something else.
Streaming within schools isn’t a bad idea, but perhaps we should look to Europe, Germany perhaps, and see what we can take to improve things here.
1st January 2008 at 7:44 pm
So there are just the smart kids and the thickos? Sounds like the Eloi and the Morlocks . . .
Yes, it was a bit like that. One of the smart kids even got murdered. But on the plus side, we were all instilled with a strong sense of Catholic morality. (This was Wimbledon College in the mid-eighties.)
Other schools however teach a moderate version of their faith, and the effects in doing so could be more beneficial than if that child goes to a secular school.
Sorry, could you please explain how ingesting a small quantity of poison is better than taking none at all? Are you some sort of homeopathist?
2nd January 2008 at 10:56 am
Schools should teach about religion, but should not teach religion. Tell them what religions there are, what they stand for, what they’ve done, the good and also the bad. Schools should educate, not indoctrinate.
Give kids the information to make up their own minds. When we allow parents the “choice” of sending kids to a faith school, we are perverting the right of children to chose their own beliefs; we are preventing them from gaining the knowledge and the chance, to critically evaluate what they and others believe.
Sending a child to a faith school is no different than sending a child to a pro-racist school. Instead of allowing children to form their own beliefs, we are placing them in an environment where a belief is explicitly accepted as correct and anyone who disagrees is immediately an outsider and at odds with authority.
I was an atheist at school (although I didn’t call myself that) and whenever I criticised religion and highlighted inconsistencies the pressure on me from teachers to shut-up and conform was noticeable and heavy with unspoken repercussions if I dared speak my mind. This was in only a mildly religious school and I dread to think how kids at strongly religious schools are treated when they disagree with the school and their parent’s views. This type of pressure to conform is a hallmark of indoctrination.
People that claim abolishing faith schools is illiberal are violating the rights of the children in favour of the rights of the parents.
Schools should be secular and should take no position whatsoever on the validity or otherwise of faiths and beliefs. Parents are free to teach about their faith and beliefs at home.
That is the only stance I believe any liberal person can take, since it protects both the rights of the children to an unbiased education and the freedom to chose their own path and the rights of the parents to pass on their values.
2nd January 2008 at 11:38 am
Re: Martin Gill @82
* applause and whistling *
2nd January 2008 at 12:00 pm
Martin @ 82:
I’m not sure that “indoctrination” is the correct term, unless it is significantly different between the state sector and the private sector. It is more about the ethos of the school than the teaching in the school. Some of the most identifiably religious private schools have many kids from families not of the faith the school professes but who are sent there simply because it has such an ethos. I can’t see the several Muslims and Hindus that are sent to the Catholic Benedictine Ampleforth, for example, being sent there to be “indoctrinated” about someone else’s faith, frankly.
2nd January 2008 at 2:21 pm
Just for my own peace of mind, may I clarify that the Sid contributing to this thread is not me.
Sid Cumberland
2nd January 2008 at 4:06 pm
no.85 - no you can’t, all Sids must be treated as one!!
I’ve read all the above at length and, just as I was doing that, MartinSGill has nipped in front of me with the finest post of all.
Religion, like it or not (and I’m a fan of Dawkins, should you care) is one more aspect of life/society and should be taught, if at all, alonside Home Economics, Photography, whatever. It is not as important as the ‘three Rs’, but if people really want to believe, let them (personally, I’d keep it in Sunday Schools, but hey, let’s be realistic for now).
Otherwise … what about Lib Dem schools?! In fact, Arsenal-fan schools for Atheist Lib Dems - they sound great!!
2nd January 2008 at 4:26 pm
Jock @ 84:
Anyone interested in learning the “ethos” of boarding schools should watch Lindsay Anderson’s “If”.
2nd January 2008 at 4:45 pm
Martin Gill - spot on.
The three Rs - resourcefulness, resilience, reflectiveness.
And ‘If….’ is one of the great films of all time.
Sid C
2nd January 2008 at 6:54 pm
I’m not sure that “indoctrination” is the correct term . . .
I’m sure. I’m very sure.
I can’t see the several Muslims and Hindus that are sent to the Catholic Benedictine Ampleforth, for example, being sent there to be “indoctrinated” about someone else’s faith, frankly.
No, me neither. That’s because they’ve already been indoctrinated into another faith, dummy.
Well said Martin!
2nd January 2008 at 7:20 pm
Anyone relying on “If…”, great film though it was, for their understanding of boarding school ethos is about forty years out of date now, just as much as one would not say “Kes” was indicative of state education today I hope. To be honest one might as well say that the more recent “Tom Brown’s Schooldays” - the one with Stephen Fry - is representative.
Although when I was at Aldenham for a year that dorm where the housemaster’s wife does the naked walkabout was still there and pretty much the same as it was in the film!
In my experience it does not appear that there is any more “indoctrination” in the sense of preaching one faith over another in faith based schools than the state mandates for all schools. I tend to think comparative religion is taught better in faith schools because they do tend to have a specialist, rather than the first form gym teacher being given RE as an extra to teach out of a book as part of PHSE.
Many people seem to be saying that it is tantamount to child abuse to send someone to a faith based school, state or otherwise. If that’s the case then the mere fact of living in a household with parents of faith must do far worse IMO - what do they propose about that?
I had to take quite a long look at the materials used, for example, at Ampleforth for religious education classes as without a degree in any other academic subject that is what I would have ended up being asked to teach if I had become a monk there and, as I say, it was very discursive and explanatory with lots of discussion of other faiths without being “indoctrinating”. More a grounding in moral philosophy than fire and brimstone preaching.
The real answer is for the state not to deliver education. As Herbert Spencer wrote:
“A sad snare would these advocates of legislative teaching betray themselves into, could they substantiate their doctrine. For what is meant by saying that a government ought to educate the people? why should they be educated? what is the education for? Clearly to fit the people for social life—to make them good citizens. And who is to say what are good citizens? The government: there is no other judge. And who is to say how these good citizens may be made? The government: there is no other judge. Hence the proposition is convertible into this—a government ought to mould children into good citizens, using its own discretion in settling what a good citizen; is, and how the child may be moulded into one. It must first form for itself a definite conception of a pattern citizen; and having done this, must elaborate such system of discipline as seems best calculated to produce citizens after that pattern. This system of discipline it is bound to enforce to the uttermost. For if it does otherwise, it allows men to become different from what in its judgment they should become, and therefore fails in that duty it is charged to fulfil.”
2nd January 2008 at 8:16 pm
If party policy is still against faith school, why is the new leader singing their praises suddenly?
Is he going against party policy or is it policy making by the leader?
2nd January 2008 at 9:05 pm
Or is he saying what he thinks?
Sid Cumberland
2nd January 2008 at 9:21 pm
Many people seem to be saying that it is tantamount to child abuse to send someone to a faith based school.
Yes. Especially if it’s Ampleforth.