Faith schools undermine equality, choice and social cohesion.
Let's build an inclusive education system today, to ensure an inclusive society tomorrow.
Our education system should be open and welcoming to all. That's why we want publicly funded faith schools phased out and an end to religiously selective school admissions.
Around a third of publicly funded schools in England and Wales are faith schools – schools with a religious character. Scottish and Northern Irish schools are still divided along sectarian lines.
Separating children according to religion is divisive and leads to religious, ethnic and socio-economic segregation.
To make matters worse, many faith schools can discriminate against pupils and teachers who do not share the religion of the school.
Parents are entitled to raise their children within a faith tradition, but they are not entitled to enlist the help of the state to do so. The state should not allow the schools it funds to inculcate children into a particular religion.
Faith schools seriously limit choice for parents who do not want a religious education for their children, or do not share the faith of the local school. Our research has found that 18,000 families were assigned faith schools against their wishes in England in 2017 alone.
Despite a consistent and dramatic decline in church attendance, and a growing majority of non-religious citizens, successive governments have paved the way for ever greater religious involvement in education, often to the detriment of inclusive community schools.
A secular approach to education would ensure publicly funded schools are equally welcoming to all children, regardless of their backgrounds.
Take action!
1. Write to your MP
Please call on your MP to support a secular, inclusive education system for all.
2. Share your story
Tell us why you support this campaign, and how you are personally affected by the issue. You can also let us know if you would like assistance with a particular issue.
3. Join us
Become a member of the National Secular Society today! Together, we can separate religion and state for greater freedom and fairness.
Latest updates
DfE doesn’t know how many schools have discriminatory admissions
Posted: Mon, 1 Nov 2021 13:09
The government has admitted it does not know how many schools apply religious discrimination in their admissions.
The Department for Education has said it "does not hold information on which schools select on the basis of religion as an element of their admissions criteria", in response to a freedom of information request from the National Secular Society.
Exemptions in the Equality Act 2010 enable some kinds of faith schools to prioritise children from particular religious backgrounds if they are oversubscribed.
The DfE has also refused to record which schools practice faith-based selection on their public data service, after the NSS urged the new schools' minister to provide transparency over school admissions.
Currently the Get Information About Schools (GIAS) service, which provides data on all schools in England, only records whether a school is academically selective. The NSS has warned this could be confusing for parents, as hundreds of schools that can select all their pupils based on faith list their admissions policy as "non-selective".
The NSS has previously warned that use of the term "non-selective" can be potentially misleading, particularly in proposals for new religiously selective schools.
NSS head of education Alastair Lichten said: "If religious groups are given exemptions from equality laws to facilitate discrimination on grounds of religion or belief, then there needs to be transparency around that. If the DfE do not and will not record which schools discriminate on this basis, and to what extent, transparency and scrutiny is impossible.
"Are they trying to spare the blushes of faith school groups who know discriminatory admissions are unpopular and morally bankrupt?
"It's long past time we ended faith-based selection. No publicly funded school should be able to discriminate against children based on their parents' beliefs."
Explaining their decision not to record religiously selective admissions, a spokesperson from the DfE told the NSS this would "constitute an additional burden for schools designated with a religious character".
The DfE also said such transparency isn't necessary because local authorities are required to provide a composite admissions prospectus, which explains the admissions policies for all schools in the area.
However, such prospectuses are inconsistent, and it can often be difficult to understand faith schools' selection criteria from the prospectus. The NSS's request would have seen a simple indication of either whether a school has religiously selective oversubscription criteria, or the number of places subject to such criteria.
How many schools have religiously discriminatory admissions?
Although the DfE does not hold data on school admissions policies, various estimates have been made of these figures. One method is to look at the numbers of different school types. The latest NSS analysis has found that in England there are:
- 2,639 voluntary aided faith schools, which may be able to religiously select up to 100% of their pupils.
- 105 faith based free schools, which may be able to religiously select up to 50% of their pupils.
- 1,624 voluntary controlled faith schools, which can only rarely religiously select pupils with the agreement of their local education authority.
- 1,952 faith-based converter academies and 490 other faith schools, which may be able to religiously select pupils, though the level of religious selection would depend on many factors including their predecessor school.
Image: Ben Molyneux, Shutterstock
Two independent Jewish schools banned from admitting new pupils
Posted: Thu, 21 Oct 2021 09:07
Two independent Jewish schools in London have been barred from admitting new pupils after inspectors identified serious and persistent failings.
The Department for Education (DfE) published enforcement notices last week which it sent to the schools in August. The enforcement action prevents the schools from admitting new pupils.
Bnois Jerusalem Girls School was given a statutory notice in 2018 after it failed to meet standards in multiple inspections.
Its most recent Ofsted inspection in March found that "teaching about the scientific theories behind the origins of [the diversity of] life" was "completely omitted".
The report also said the content of the school's secular curriculum "remains narrow" and pupils were "not allowed to talk about" same-sex relationships or gender reassignment "at any time".
The school's previous failings have included teaching creationism in geography and science and failing to enter pupils for exams at GCSE level because leaders were not allowed to censor exam papers.
TTD Gur School, an all-boys school, failed to meet all standards inspected in March. The inspection report said its plans for teaching personal, social, health and economic (PSHE) education did not include "opportunities to learn about the protected characteristics set out in the Equality Act 2010", including "the roles of women".
It said the school's secular subject curriculum was "weak", and pupils did not have enough opportunities to learn about Britain, other cultures and other countries.
The inspector was unable to find out about how pupils respect people from different backgrounds, because school leaders did not permit the inspector to discuss anything with pupils aside from "safety, safeguarding, learning, behaviour and bullying".
Leaders were unable to provide a curriculum policy or schemes of work for the subjects taught, the report said. Leaders could not show how they promote "mutual respect and tolerance of those with different faiths and beliefs" or fundamental British values.
NSS head of education Alastair Lichten said: "These schools are failing because they prioritise religious indoctrination over teaching children the knowledge they need to prepare them for adult life.
"No school, whatever its ethos, should be allowed to deprive its pupils of their basic right to a suitable education."
"The DfE is right to take action. But if these schools continue to refuse to provide a decent standard of education, they must be closed down."
More information
Protect relationships and sex education
Age-appropriate relationships and sex education should be every child’s right.
Remove religious appointees from Scottish councils
Religion shouldn’t grant people privileged places in local democracy.
Research and reports
The faith schools research bank
The choice delusion: how faith schools restrict school choice
Three in ten families across England live in areas where most or all of the closest primary schools are faith schools and thousands are being assigned faith schools against their wishes.
Power grab: Academisation and the threat to secular education
Academisation has enabled faith groups to increase their influence over all schools, including those with no religious character. With little public debate, religious governance has increased, while secular oversight has diminished.
Religiosity inspections: the case against faith-based reviews of state schools
Faith based inspections of state schools are an unnecessary drain on public finds, frame widely held values as exclusive, and promote biased religious education.
Faith-shaped holes: How religious privilege is undermining equality law (PDF, 1.3 Mb)
