Agenda item

(To receive a presentation by Wendy Harrison, RE Adviser, on the role and purpose of SACRE)

SACRE received a presentation from Wendy Harrison and Gillian Georgiou in connection with SACRE's responsibilities, its role and membership.

Wendy Harrison outlined the makeup and responsibilities of SACREs. This included legal requirements regarding RE and Collective Worship. The point was made that in some schools the law was not properly followed in relation to Collective Worship and Ofsted seemed to be inconsistent in the way it inspected it, especially in secondary schools. Gillian Georgiou made the point that Collective Worship was still valued in Church of England schools. Wendy Harrison talked about the role of SACREs in relation to academies and it was agreed that more effort was needed to ensure that Academies were represented on Lincolnshire SACRE.

Gillian Georgiou provided an explanation about different types of schools, including Church schools. These included voluntary controlled community schools, voluntary controlled schools with religious character (Church of England/Methodist schools) and voluntary aided schools, including some Church of England schools as well as Catholic, Muslim, etc, faith schools. Voluntary controlled schools were required to follow the Agreed Syllabus and were subject to inspection by Ofsted. Voluntary Aided schools had their own governing bodies, (Boards of Trustees in the case of academies) and were able to set their own guidelines on how RE was delivered and were subject to inspection by denominational or faith based inspectors instead of Ofsted.

With regard to academies these were not statutorily required to follow a locally Agreed Syllabus. Academies that were originally voluntary controlled schools could have their RE inspected as part of an Ofsted "deep dive". Academies that were originally voluntary aided schools or had been set up with voluntary aided governance had their RE inspected by denominational/faith based inspection.

Comments by Members and the responses of officers, included:-

·         Could the Diocesan Board of Education receive the presentation as there were a lot of new members? Gillian Georgiou agreed to raise this request with the Diocesan Director of Education.

·         New governors to church schools were informed about the different types of church schools when they were appointed.

·         The teaching of RE as an academic subject was updated by the Government in 2010 but this did not affect the statutory requirements required of schools. The guidance relating to Collective Worship in Circular 1/94 of the 1988 Education Act had not been updated. This had led to many schools, particularly secondary schools, not meeting the statutory requirements in relation to Collective Worship. The changes to Ofsted inspections over the years had also exacerbated the problem with collective worship increasingly being side lined. Officers stated that acts of Collective Worship were seen as anachronistic in some (CoE (deleted)) schools. It was noted that RE and Collective Worship were not the same thing but schools needed support in the way they made provision for both.

·         The point was made that a number of Roman Catholic schools were not aware of SACRE and its purpose.

·         Did the Minster School, Lincoln, receive any advice about the teaching of RE and the Agreed Syllabus by the Council and the Diocese? Officers stated that they were not aware of any advice being given to the Minster School and it was agreed that there was no reason why advice could not be given similar to that provided to academies.

RESOLVED

(a)  That officers be thanked for their presentation.

(b)  That Gillian Georgiou ask the Diocesan Director of Education if she would like the presentation to be given to the Diocesan Board of Education.