RE to be incorporated into England’s national curriculum

Humanists are celebrating as the Education Secretary announces plans to introduce Religious Education (RE) into the national curriculum for England.

Currently, RE is mandatory for children of compulsory school age in all state-funded schools. The syllabus in schools with no religious designation is determined at a local level by an Agreed Syllabus Conference, which includes representatives of Christian denominations. This local syllabus must “reflect the fact that religious traditions in Great Britain are in the main Christian”.

However, under these plans, the national curriculum would set new requirements for schools, including the teaching of non-religious worldviews.

It is not yet clear what the arrangements will be for schools with a religious designation, which currently make up a third of state schools in England.

Humanist inclusion

Bridget Phillipson claimed that “Learning about the world’s great faiths and traditions teaches children not just about the world, but how to live alongside and tolerate one another within it. In such fractured times, it should be a source of hope that those representing the full spectrum of religion in this county have reached consensus on the most fundamental of points: what our children should learn about the world’s faiths, communities and traditions.”

She said representatives from “every major faith and a wide range of communities have come together to agree a shared vision”, adding: “With so much focus on what divides us – and race and religion so often at the heart of that division – equipping young people with the knowledge, understanding and values that religious education teaches could hardly be more important.”

making social cohesion the aim of RE

The Department for Education stated that pupils are to learn about festivals, seasonal occasions, and “matters of importance to both organised traditions and individual ways of living.” The curriculum will explore how beliefs and values support tolerance and are reflected locally “through practices, celebrations, the arts, buildings and service”.

Humanists UK were involved in the drafting of the new curriculum, and its Chief Executive Andrew Copson hailed the changes as “a momentous step for inclusion”, and claimed that “including humanism would give every pupil a richer, more relevant, and more rounded education”.

The Chair of the RE Council of England and Wales (co-founded by Humanists UK), Sarah Lane Cawte, said: “A National Curriculum for RE will ensure every child, in every school, receives their entitlement to high quality religious education – in both religious and non-religious traditions – that is academically rigorous and personally inspiring”.

Agendas

The Christian Institute’s Head of Education, John Denning, commented: “In too many schools, Religious Education is poor, so the push for reform is understandable. However, the quality of RE will not be improved if it is treated simply as a means to promote ‘inclusion’. Learning about different faiths and customs can help build mutual understanding — that’s a welcome by-product of Religious Education.

“But making social cohesion the aim of RE is a different matter entirely. It risks hollowing out the subject, shifting the focus away from religious truth claims and their basis — in the Bible, for example — and towards something else altogether.

“Bridget Phillipson speaks of ‘equipping young people with the knowledge, understanding and values that religious education teaches.’ But what values, exactly? And who decides?

The curriculum is not a tool for the Government to promote its own agenda

“RE should engage children with the teachings and practices of religion. It must not be repurposed into a vehicle for promoting the Government’s preferred cultural narrative. The curriculum is not a tool for the Government to promote its own agenda.”

He continued: “Non-religious views are already routinely taught in RE as a counterpoint to religious views, but the explicit inclusion of non-religious worldviews as an object of study in their own right within Religious Education raises concerns about where the boundaries of the subject lie. There is a risk that unfocussed teaching on personal worldviews will undermine substantive study of religious belief systems. With only a minority of those who describe themselves as non-religious actually holding secular humanist beliefs, the emphasis on humanism appears disproportionate.

“It will be important that there is wide participation in the public consultation in September to provide the Government with a genuine picture of the breadth of views.”