discuss.

When I get home I will - very slow dial up here - but I am in favor of faith based schools but I don't think they should be funded by tax dollars.

To really have this argument you need to define how you see a multi-cultural society.

I am delighted to welcome many cultures into the society that I am a part of and I am happy to see people from those cultures become integrated but retain their identity as a cultural grouping. Thus, I don't follow the Tebbit test of wondering whether you support England or Pakistan (the West Indies or whoever) in the cricket because I think you can have it both ways. It is possible to be completely at one with your new culture and still long for the old home team to whup the host culture in some sporting challenge. To get away from Tebbitt, at home Small J, an Irishwoman, supports Ireland when they meet the English in the Rugby, but otherwise follows both teams with an even hand.

If you want the above and you want people to maintyain the things that make them what they are and if you see faith as being central to the things that make them what they are then why would you be against allowing people to follow their faith and be educated in a way that makes their faith central to their education. Of course, how you pay for it, ensure fair delivery to all and so on is a very different question and one that I am not able to answer well.

If your view of a multicultural society is of a moving target always homogenous but changing its essence to reflect numbers of moslems, catholics, jews, or to reflect regional diets or any variation that will emerge with people from different cultures coming together but will always see those variations flattened into a new whole then perhaps faith based schools would be an anachronsim as they tend to seek to celebrate the differences. This latter model is not my preferred view of multicultural society.

Every state school in England (and the UK as far as I know) is required by law to involve children in a daily act of worship of a broadly Christian nature. You could say therefore, that all schools are faith schools. In reality though, very few do. Some schools, like the one I work in, seek permission to opt out of this as it is often a strange request, especially in city schools, where children from actively Christian families are in the minority. My school has children from 40 odd countries, speaking 63 different languages and most major faiths are represented, none in any large numbers. To tell us that we have to provide a broadly Christian daily act of worship is clearly nonsense.

now that really is an anachronism!!

Is it a nonsence to provide a broadly Christian daily act.

Or is it nonsence that we have schools with children from over 40 countries,speaking 63 different languages.

You pay yer money,you take your choice.

Manifesto of the hard-left:..........'To constantly water down and diminish what they were born into,and to support anything that contributes to that objective'.

My son goes to a Catholic School although my family is Greek Orthodox. There are boys (it's single sex) from many cultures in the school and to think it is not multicultural because of its Catholic ethos is a mistake. It is also a mistake to think that a single religion is rammed down the boys' throats. They are taught about a number of religions during their RE lessons and are taught to respect other people's rights to a religion - or their right to choose not to have a religion, as the case may be.

Granted the majority of the boys are from Irish or Italian descent, but there are boys whose families originate from every continent on the roll. It's a very ethnically mixed school. As well as the Italian and Irish boys, there are boys with roots in Poland, Spain, Mexico, Brazil, Canada, Fiji, Lebanon, India, Ghana, Nigeria, South Africa, Zimbabwe and many other countries in my son's year alone.

There are many reasons we as parents and our boys chose this school. Their intake is very mixed ability yet they are one of the top achieving schools in our area. It is the only non selective state school that admits boys in the top 5 schools in the borough. This school gets the most out of those boys who want to achieve their potential. As well as academic achievement, the school excels in music and sports, and provides trade related courses for the less academic boys (such as plumming, etc) and encourages the boys to take on extra currciular activities such as music tuiton, sports, awards programmes. My son is very interested in ancient civilisations - this was one of the few schools in the borough that offers Classics as a standard subject in Key Stage 3 (ages 12-14 ). We also chose this school because, contrary to some education beliefs, we believe in a traditional, disciplined, firm but fair environment for our children to be schooled in.

In the main, the boys leave confident young men most of whom have reached their potential and are proud to have attended the school. Not all, and no school is going to be perfect for everyone but this school is ideal for my son, and more importantly, it's the school that he was desperate to go to.

It is also important to some people, Protestant, Catholic, Jewish and Muslim that their children receive a basic religious grounding and are educated in an environment that allows for this.

I don't understand this - are you suggesting this is the school's policy?? This is an ordinary London state primary school. It reflects the streets around it.

If the aim of a multi-cultural society is to foster diversity and tolerance thereof then the idea of faith schools is an anachronism. This is very different from saying that children shouldn't be exposed to different faiths. I think, for example, that religious studies should be a forum in which different belief systems (incl. atheism) are explored and discussed by all children in schools which are broadly secular. I think there is a danger that less emphasis will be given to this in a faith school. If you want to opt out of the state system and pay for your child to be privately educated in a faith school then that's your choice but I don't think a culture that professes to be secular should be involved in providing an education that seperates you out from your peers on the basis of your parents' faith.

The thing is though that the promotion of multi-culturalism though an honourable ideal has in fact over the last 30 years in the UK, created much racial division. There was a documentary about this a while back by Kenan Malik that was fascinating. Here's a link, covering some aspects of the program, in it he showed how asian kids got bussed to an all asian school in England and had in fact never even spoken to a white person. The divisions that multiculturalism causes are now in fact embraced by the BNP.


http://www.kenanmalik.com/tv/an_mc.html

Thing is due to PC-ness tying everyone in knots, if you disagree wtih multiculturalism you are branded a racist, however if you support it you effectively create racial division, which is itself facist. You people have been fed so much bullshit, told what to think for so long you don't know whether you're coming or going anymore. Do you support racism accidentally or on purpose, do you prefer war or genocide, are you for solutions or ideology. We know what you are against, but are you actually for anything?

Children are taught about different belief systems in RE lessons. In non religious schools, the teaching are pretty much secular. In a Voluntary Aided school, by virtue of the fact that the schools have a religious ethos, it's impossible for the teaching of religion to be non-secular.

I'm uncomfortable with the underlying suggestion here that children who go to religious schools end up at odds with our multicultural society as I truely believe this is not the case. There is a comprehensive school half a mile from where we live and the children of friends attend this school. There is far more racial and religious intollerance and much less respect for different cultures in that school, than at my son's school. It is also the school I went to, and from what I can tell, judging from what my friends tell me, little has changed there in terms of the underachieving and racism that eminates from this school. The main reasons I did not want my son to go there.

as i started this thread i will have to wade in with my twopen'rth soon.

meanwhile, on my lunchbreak, i have just been reading polly toynbee in the guardian, which makes intertesting reading related to this debate.....

The US believes in separation of church and state, and so do I. Unfortunately, George Bush and his people want to redefine what separation means, but that is a different debate. I don't want my taxes to go to privately funded schools, which in the US include religious schools.

just in case you missed the multi culturism cross thread ...it's billy on the telly tonight.

GGGGRRR. So many good points, so little time to respond. May have to wait until after Easter to respond. I will put in my two cents though. (I am sure you are all waiting on the edge of your seats. )

After Easter is a long time. My arms hurt.

sorry... i've got to go to the bathroom .......................

It's a little bit odd when a small child has an imaginary friend. For an adult to have one is ridiculous. When the state pays for your imaginary friend it's a disgrace.

LOL Braggtopia!

And when the state pays for small children to be indoctrinated, by highly qualified adults, with belief in imaginary friends, you have to ask why?

The dominant ideologies in all societies are those which serve the interests of the ruling class.

So why are our children taught to believe in supernatural gods and such like?

Could it be a method of social control? After all, when you look at the leaders of these religions they are almost always fully paid up members of the ruling class.

When the chips are down and the ruling class is faced with a socialist revolution you can always rely on the religious leaders to support the ruling class, and to use their influence on working people to damage any movements for social change.

In Britain during the 1926 General Strike the religious leaders all opposed the strike. In the miners strike they did the same. Some priests were even describing the miners as "evil". Now where have I heard that word used recently?

Organised religion is used as a method of control. The creationist conception of history which is based on faith not facts, is taught to our children in order to control their minds not to liberate them.

Even teaching children "comparative" religions is not enough. They are still left with no scientific explanation of the world.

The Materialist conception of history, i.e. everything which exists is based on matter, is the only scientific explanation of the world and should at least be taught alongside the creationist view. Children could make up their own minds then about where the truth is.

No tax payers money should be spent on religious schools. If religious people want to teach their beliefs they should do so away from the schooling system.

I'd like to comment on a couple of Pauls comments and add to the discussion...

I can only speak of catholic schools, but certainly science (and all the 'usual' subjects) IS taught, in fact, the subject matter and the way in which it's taught does't really differ between religious and state schools here in Oz. Schools that teach "creationism" are very much the exception, not the rule. And even if they do, they are still required to teach the scientific view of the world as well, since every student undergoes the same set of exams and assessments in the last two or three years of their education.

Your statement that children are left with no scientific explanation of the world is a dangerous generalisation, and quite untrue. Rather, kids that graduate from religious schools go on to work (often as leaders) as doctors, nurses, engineer's, materials scientists, architects, technicians, researchers, environmental activists, whatever... all disciplines that are founded on science.

I would say that children who attend religious schools grow up with an understanding that the world is not a "black and white" place, that there is more than one way of looking at things; That there's NOT a single, "right" way of making sense of the world. Perhaps these kids are better prepared to handle the challenges and anachronisms of life as a result of a broader education?

Also, I would say that the majority of people I attended school with did not blindly accept what they were taught in RE. Most sought to make up their own minds about things, to fit it into a much bigger picture. Religious people (or people who attend religios schools) are not spineless idiots who cant think for themselves.

It's an interesting debate about whether organised religion is really a means of controlling the masses, and to be honest, my thoughts on this change from day to day... it's a whole different discussion. (Though looking at the way religion has been used in the past I would certainly agree with you there.) But, to think about it just in terms of schooling, I don't think that is the case anymore. I don't agree that a person who's educated in a religious school is unable to make up their own mind about things, religious or otherwise. In my experience they are critical, questioning, and more than capable of thinking for themselves.

But, if generalisations are OK, then isn't it equally possible for children who attend non religious schools to become adults who are narrowminded, unable to think for themselves and too easily accepting of whatever they are told to believe. It just depends on how you look at it, doesn't it?

Ultimately, it should be up to the parent and (when they are old enough to participate in the decision) the child as to the type of school that child attends.

At the tender age of twelve I realised that, having entered the condition of manhood some time previously, it was time for me to give up childish things. So I turned my back on the Christian religion and became an atheist ... I never looked back. Overnight I lost my zits, abused myself silly without cowering in fear from the fires of hell and generally began to enjoy life,

Bolstered by my new found confidence I wrote to my headmaster demanding, on behalf of myself and a few like minded compatriots, that as Jewish kids, Muslim kids, Jehovah's witnesses and even a couple of Sally Army kids were all excused the constipated pain of Morning Assembly then atheists like us should also be excused ....

The bastard gave me an hours detention and wrote a very rude letter to my Dad ...

So you were 'ANTI-religion' at the age of 12..........and i bet youv'e been 'ANTI-everything' ever since.

'If we lose our innocence ,we lose our very soul.' - Paul Weller.

My brother was an atheist at aged 12, too. He read Bertrand Russell a lot then. I think he got some weird kind of spiritualism based on a misunderstanding of Native American beliefs later in his adult life. However, I became an atheist at age 31 after my mother took me to her fundamentalist Christian church.

I see no reason for state supported schools to ram religion down children's throats.

Are you sure you aren't confusing innocence with ignorance, klf.

Damn, Carol already answered it.

I bet JC had you for a sunbeam by the time you were twelve - pity he didn't use his heavenly powers to educate you and teach you how to use the English language properly ...

I remember sitting in assembly at primary school, aged about 8, looking around at all the kids and teachers with their "hands together and eyes closed" and thinking how silly they'd all feel when they realised that there wasn't a god. I don't think I ever believed it.

Once I discovered what humanism was, I decided that was what I was. I was about 12.

I got married in a humanist ceremony and we wrote our vows. Basically, if our marriage was going to work, we didn't think god would have anything to do with it, it was up to us.

as did we. that was about 6 years ago, and we still have friends and family telling us it was the most memorable and meaningful wedding they've attended.

in the province in which we live, representatives of the Humanist Association are sanctioned to perform wedding ceremonies. these are equal to, and as legally binding as, any civil or religious marriage. i highly recommend it to those not having religious persuasion, but still wanting something more personal and intimate than a civil ceremony. although i'm not sure of the legalities in britain or elsewhere.

as far as faith based schools are concerned...i have no problem with them, but i don't think they should be funded by the state. religion should only be taught/discussed in public schools in a comparative way.

Faith Schools are an anachronism, but faiths aren't - unless they teach that theirs is the only faith. But even then, I don't see any reason why they can't have those parts removed. Perhaps still taught as removed parts, to bring the faith to the new stage.

Even then, though, I don't see that they need to be taught in schools, unless they all are. They need to be taught somewhere, and all people are to have access to all of them, but you can't force people to have faith.

As Adi Da says: "The Secular "Error" (Era) must come to an end", but he'll have to get up a bit earlier than that to trap this cat! That said, I take his point very well that under the present secular system, too little is done to encourage spiritual practise - of any sort. But I only mean encourage - and only any sort (that tolerates the others). A sabbath, say - even as a time of day - can and will be spent goofing off by people without that bone in their bodies (as long as they don't discourage others, of course). Forcing people to a spiritual practise is not the business of a tolerant but spiritual state. And it's too invasive - a misuse of the strength is really got to allow people to be their own adult on their own two feet mentally anyway.

Thanks for pointing that out, Albeer.......should have read 'lose' instead of 'loose'.

Having said that ....i thought you would be glad that i didn't use the 'English' language properly,as you normally hate all things 'English'.

when my dad died we had a secular funeral which we conducted ourselves at the local crematorium. For a split second, when the funeral director said 'of course there won't be a committal without a vicar' i thought i may be sending my poor dad to burn in hell. Just goes to show how all that hands together stuff indoctrinates you

in my view school isn't the place for worshipping: just for learning.

i certainly don't agree with state funded faith schools and in a broader view i am opposed to fee paying schools. We'd soon have a better education system if everybody had to opt in!!!.

Paul R I take your general point that religion has often been used a means of social control but a cursory look at history shows a more nuanced picture. Think of the black civil rights movement in the 60's in the US (it came out of the southern baptist churches); the Quakers are pacifists and have opposed nearly every major war I can think of; the Diggers, Ranters and Levellers of the English Civil War formed their ideas out of a belief that Christ would come again and was the "Great Leveller" or the "Leveller of men"; the catholic priests who fought on the side of the oppressed in Southern and Central America against the US-backed death squads and counter revolutionaries.

I think it's a crude understanding of the historical materialist critique of religion to say that all religions always reinforce the dominant ideology of the ruling classes.

FWIW, I'm an atheist.

OK. Back to the faith schools debate.

You really are an incredibly annoying little cretin, aren't you? Your posts never really made much sense (both in content and in the way they're written), but they're getting worse every day. I don't think I've ever read a KLF post that's made any useful contribution to a discussion. This one seems to sum the KLF up perfectly.


As for faith schools, I'm with Braggtopia and paulr, although I must point out that with the exception of Ohio[1] and the Vardy colleges[2] public schools in Britain and the US don't teach creationism.

-----
1. In the past couple of months Ohio approved a silly biology lesson plan [1] for teaching examples from a book called "Icons of Evolution" by creationist Jonathan Wells. The book manages to be about as useful as the KLF. [2], [3]

2. The colleges (one is in gateshead, the other I forget the location, and I've forgotten the names) are only partially funded by the Vardy Foundation. They are called "independent" but are partially govt funded so could therefore be considered state schools [4]

(edited to add link to cnn article)

Joe....As the old saying goes.....'the one losing his temper,is the one losing the argument.

I would suggest that i can hold my head high......i cetainly would'nt call someone (for instance) an 'annoying little cretin' even though some people on hear have more than deserved it over the years.....I would consider that 'rude' and demeaning to myself.

Even though i have been sworn at and been called many things by you 'peace lovers' over the years, i refuse to lower myself and join in a slanging match.

I think the nearest i've come to blowing my top, is this week when Alberr posted some offencive and 'possibly' libellous remarks regarding racism....In the end i just called him 'a prize plum'.....that's as abusive as i get.


Now what was that quote?......''you can tell the worth of a man,not by how he treats his friends but by how he treats his enemies''.......or something to that effect.

You mean "here."

Don't you start.

Oh? My post was in response to your fallacious claims that Al has been "Anti everything" since the age of twelve. The way you took Al's atheism and extrapolated an "anti everything" from it certainly seemed hostile (and ridiculous at the same time).

-----------

This topic reminded me that the EvoWiki needed an article about the Vardy Foundation and Emmanuel College, and the beginnings of my article are at http://www.evowiki.org/wiki.phtml?title=Va...ardy_Foundation

A few relevant articles I've found in my trawls (only some of which I've got 'round to reading entirely):

Faith Schools

• Facts About Faith Schools
  
• Ahmed, K., 2001/11/11. 80% Against new faith schools, in The Guardian
  
• Wintour, P., 2002/02/07. Backbench rebelion over faith schools, in The Guardian
  
• Matthewman, S., 2003/06/03. Faith schools could get the power to sack gay teachers
  
• Walsh, S., Should 'sleeping dog' be left to lie?, from This is Bradford

State Funded "Academies"

• British Humanist Association, 2003. State-funded "Academies" - are they democratic?.

Am I allowed to bring "Academies" into a discussion of faith schools?

Haven't got time right now to read the faith schools stuff (but I'm not for them).

Liked the state funded one (but not the academies (/sell-outs/prostitutes)):

I liked the 'bulleted' point-form part.

Quote:
"Comprehensive schools are operating covert selection with some using every possible device to avoid admitting the dim and the difficult, says new research from Sheffield Hallam University . ..The existence of even one selective school in an area could trigger significant responses (either aggressive or defensive) from other schools and have far-reaching effects," the study says.. It also points out that the problems are worse for parents in areas of partial selection, with specialist schools and foundation and aided schools relatively free to set their own criteria. They warn that the polarisation of intake caused by selection will get worse as the number of specialist schools increases in line with Government aims."

I see a seperation of students of different skills/intelligence, possibly as to campus, but what this says is that the Dim will be denied a place anywhere - which you can't have and there's no reason why you would, and also the troublesome - which you could almost have, and there are reasons for disallowing - just no very good ones.

As for teaching eccentricities - time to give 'em a bakin'! No choice but to move into the C Clarke Childhood's End!

Having read most of Alberr's posts on here for the last couple of years, i think my comments were valid.

Of course I never went to a faith school, I went to a state school. But I was subjected to punishment for not accepting the Christian religion. Perhaps there is a more liberal attitude today.

To get back to the thread, yes I do believe that faith schools are an anachronism and I do not agree that I should support them or any other type of privileged private education financially through my taxes. I have no argument with people enjoying their various faiths. I am not worried too much if people want to set up schools to teach their faith so long as they do nothing illegal and hold them outside of normal school hours.

Faith has been part of the human condition for thousands of years, ever since that first person sat up watching over the tribe in the dark waiting for the sun to come back. "Here comes the sun ...." Thousands of years before the Jews invented God or the Romans marketed Christianity.

I have faith but not in religion, of any sort, and I resent having to pay taxes to support religious schools.

The universe has been around for billions of years.......life on it,for hundreds of millions.

since life on earth began, mans existance ammounts to no more than 0.000001 of that time and a single humans existance to no more than 0.000000000000000001 of that time (or something to that effect).


Well it's nice to know that in that minute amount of time, Albeer has worked out all the answers .

I like this thread ... it is about whether faith schools are an anachronism and I think they are ...

KLF You have posted a lot in this thread without giving an opinion on the subject.

Are faith schools an anachronism?

I'm in two minds........instinctivley i would say yes, but the three best schools (exam table wise) in my area are faith schools.......maybe it's extra funding or whatever, i don't know....but that's the facts.

Faith schools have a greater ability to pick and choose their students and staff in a perpetuating cycle (good results = more people applying = pick the best students = good results etc).

Plus, you're making the same mistake as Blair: good exam results = good education. School should do more than teach you how to pass exams, and segregating students by religion isn't one of them.

klf, test scores are not the most reliable criteria for excellence in schools. First of all, in order for this to be a scientific study, the schools would have to have similar pools of test subjects. If the faith schools are able to pick and choose who will attend and kick out those who do not conform to rules or academic standards, thus leaving the "less academically successful to the nonfaith schools (this is what happens in the US), then the criteria is totally unfair.

Also, in San Francisco parents who actually visit the low scoring schools are often surprised at what is offered and sometimes end up sending their children to these schools, despite the recorded test scores. The main problem is, parents often know nothing about these schools except their test scores.

Whether this means that faith schools are anachronistic, I don't know. It seems to me, worldwide trends indicate that people have become more religious, whether that religion be Christian or Islamic. Still, a strict separation of church and state should be the rule that all countries live by, but that just shows my US bias.

Schools should do more than teach you how to pass exams. Exactly

From personal experience, and the experiences of lots of my friends, I would suggest that this is precisely one very good reason in favour of faith schools...

Having been to a couple, it's NOT just about learning how to pass exams, or remembering what happened in 1066 or 1788. Ethics, tolerance, critical thinking, personal responsibility, interaction with others, respect for others' beliefs all feature in being educated at a religios school.

Though as I said before, everyone is entitled to their own opinions on the subject... what's good for one person may not be good for the next. We just need to respect each others differences a little.

Do you really want me to tell you?

precisely!

and you don't need faith or religion for any of those things.

they are what makes us a society.

i'll bet maggie went to church on sundays

Wow! I got something of a step up from normal then, and all I can say is Wow!

Perhaps that's what I thought I might get out of psychedelics, and which my failure to do so - and get on that level - lead me to hoard for.

I'm going to call Adidam Monday and take the nearest available Vow (if He'll have me, if it'll help me).

If there is anything at all that I can do for you to serve you in any way in the future, please let me know.

I assure you the lesson has been learned, and I was well back down when I wrote to Dad - about the political change, alone. No-one in my immediate family here passed anything on to anyone before I got a hold of myself, and told them to. They either don't believe me, or appreciated my seriousness about the secrecy.

Please, can I have a job? I beg you.

The Tailor of Panama.

PS. First Death in the Family?! The twins?

& they probably are an anachronism, possibly requiring nothing to be said at all.

Though I agree with Joe's, Carol's and Jacki's points about the problem of judging education by test results (a bogus idea) my best friend teaches in one of the highest rating secondary schools in Portsmouth (or the South East of England, I'm not sure... ) but it is a secular school. It is, however, an all-girls school though whether or not this factor is significant I'm not really sure.

EJB's mum (now a teacher) went to my old (girls) school. i hated it but when i talked to her about it the other day (with this thread in mind) she hotly defended it. I was pleased to hear it hadn't been such a ghastly experience for her.

As i and both my children went to single sex schools (not a deliberate choice) i still find it very hard to get my head round the idea of teenage boys and girls in the same classroom

I asked my daughter what she thought and she said it was probably best for girls. I said it probably wasn't best for me as i spent all my time thinking about boys!

sort of on topic: she'd just had a wierd experience, supply teaching a reception class (not her normal age group) and having to tell them they were getting easter eggs because a man had been hung up on a bit of wood by having his hands nailed to it. (or words to that effect)

leaving aside the gruesomness of the easter story for 5 year olds ....

do english state schools still teach the christmas and easter stories .... virgin birth, ressurrection etc.... with an assumption of truth ???

bring back oestre! the goddess of HRT patches!