How do we open up admissions to faith schools?

By Mike Ion / @MikeIon

Last year Ed Balls ordered an investigation after the Department for Children, Schools and Families revealed that a “significant number” of schools in three sample areas were breaking the statutory admissions code. Breaches included parents being asked for money and personal and financial details. There were also concerns that faith schools have not been taking enough children who are vulnerable including those with special needs and those eligible for free school meals.

At present we know that nearly half of all schools and local authorities in England are failing to abide by new admissions guidelines, with faith schools among the worst offenders. Might I propose three practical suggestions for reform:

1) Insist that all state funded voluntary aided (VA) faith schools set aside a minimum of 20% of its annual intake for the pupils of parents of other faiths or none.

2) Require all VA faith schools to publish their admission figures (criterion referenced) annually.

3) Require all VA faith schools to provide LAs with action plans (updated annually) as to how the school will actively seek to promote community cohesion.

At present, faith schools may select 100% of pupils from parents who share their faith. To be fair, most religious primary schools try to serve their local neighbourhood and often accept children of other faiths and of none. Like non-religious schools, many of them do a brilliant job and some do not. All religious secondary schools give some preference to children of their faith, some try to be inclusive and accept a significant proportion of children from other faiths – many do not.

I am firmly of the view that opening up faith schools to the pupils of parents of different faiths (or none) would be a positive move towards greater social and educational inclusion. A faith school that is true to its core values and principles will surely be one that seeks to be open and accessible to all pupils, one that would pay particular attention to the needs of the marginalised and the poor.

The problem is that the forces of conservatism that dominate many faith groups are deeply resistant to change. For example, the Catholic Education Service (CES) has argued that it is spurious to suggest that removing the absolute right of a religious community to educate its own children by introducing a percentage non-faith quota for church schools would aid social cohesion.

As someone whose teaching career was solely in the VA Roman Catholic sector I would suggest that it is neither spurious nor indeed is it contrary to the mission of the church itself. Indeed I would go further and challenge the CES to publish a complete list of state funded Catholic schools (secondaries in particular) where it is already custom and practice that between 20%-30% of pupils come from other faith backgrounds or none.

I am not against faith schools – I attended one, have taught in them and sent my children to them. My challenge to faith communities that run some of our state schools is to reflect on the type of educational provision that they would be happy to support and indeed help shape in 21st century Britain. I suspect that they would want an inclusive and comprehensive system that intrinsically values and caters for all pupils regardless of their spiritual, economic or social capital.

The key question is: can the exisiting admission policies for faith schools help to deliver this vision? At present the answer is no.