Agenda and minutes

There were no announcements.

Apologies for absence were received from Lynne Trigg, Alice Fuller, Christopher Cawse, Michelle Chalibamba, Cllr Phil Rosenberg, Cllr Don Williams, Esther Fenty, Krishna Pujara, and Peter Ginnings.

To approve and sign the minutes of the SACRE meeting held on 11^th February 2014.

Consideration was given to the minutes of the meeting held on 11^th February 2014.

Jean Harrison asked that it be noted that she had sent her apologies to the meeting.

RESOLVED –

THAT the minutes be signed and approved as a correct record, subject to the addition above.

There were no declarations of interest.

Report of the Professional Adviser to SACRE.

TO FOLLOW

Consideration was given to a tabled report on the application for a Determination by Eleanor Palmer School. The report can be found at Appendix A to the minutes.

A visit had been undertaken to the school and members had been impressed by the school environment and by the teaching.

However, the Chair expressed concern that the school did not have a member of staff who was an RE specialist. This was a problem faced by many primary schools.

Members also noted that the school had said that a plurality (40%) of pupils came from ‘non-religious’ backgrounds. However, this meant that the majority of pupils came from families who identified with a religion, and so members felt it was important that collective worship gave pupils a chance to worship rather than being similar to a PHSE (Personal, Health and Social Education) lesson.  

A member commented that there was misunderstanding about the requirements of the Education Act 1944 that some schools and governors held. A Determination would exempt a school from the requirement for collective worship to be of a ‘broadly Christian’ character but not from the requirement to have collective worship.

Members agreed the Determination and asked the Chair and the Professional Advisor to liaise with one another on a letter to send to the school to inform them of this and of the points raised in the discussion.

                                                ACTION: Chair of SACRE

                                                                 Professional Advisor to SACRE

RESOLVED –

(i)            THAT the Determination for Eleanor Palmer school be granted;

(ii)          THAT the Chair of SACRE write to the school to inform them of the decision and to mention points raised by SACRE members in discussion.

An oral report from the Professional Adviser to SACRE.

Lesley Prior, the Professional Advisor to SACRE, who served as Chair of NASACRE spoke to members about its AGM.

Rev Jim Walters apologised for not being able to attend the AGM on behalf of Camden SACRE. Camden SACRE was a member of NASACRE and Camden Council was currently processing the invoice for renewal of its membership. Membership gave Camden SACRE members the ability to access a password-controlled website with NASACRE information.

Stephen Lloyd, the Liberal Democrat MP for Eastbourne, who chaired the All-Party Parliamentary Group on RE had addressed the NASCARE AGM. Ms Prior said that members had been grateful that he had taken the time to speak to the AGM on what would have been a very busy day for him (22^nd May, local and European election day).

The publicity around certain schools in Birmingham had raised the profile of the importance of RE and religion in schools. There was concern that the not been clear in terms of explaining the role of SACREs for local authority community schools and the duty of community schools to follow the agreed syllabus of their LA.

It was also commented that people were not aware that SACREs did not have responsibility for the syllabus for academies and free schools. RE in those schools was governed by their funding agreement with the Department for Education.

An oral report of the Professional Adviser to SACRE.

Lesley Prior highlighted to members that the All-Party Parliamentary Group on RE had produced two reports: on teaching training and on RE and community cohesion.

They could be seen on the RE Council’s website. The Clerk was to send a link to this to members via email.

                                                            ACTION: Clerk to SACRE (VS)

An oral report of the Professional Adviser to SACRE.

Please also see:

http://us4.campaign-archive1.com/?u=a742773f8f89e11e47d388c29&id=7e6e62a33f&e=%5BUNIQID%5D

There was a discussion about developments in Religious Education nationally. Ms Prior informed members that Expert Advisory Groups (EAG) were being assembled by the Government to work on reviewing the curriculum for each subject. She was a member of the RE EAG. The EAGs were not receiving funding directly and, in future, would be being supported by publishers.

Tracey Edwards highlighted that there was concern that RE had fallen off some schools’ agendas following the move to the English Baccalaureate which did not include RE. She also observed that the new GCSE for RE being introduced in 2016 was going to be more ‘philosophical’ in its emphasis and so include study of Kant and Plato in addition to religious content.

It was noted that Esther Fenty wished to resign as a member of SACRE. A place would thus need to be kept vacant for a Pentecostal representative on the committee.

The Chair said that he was liaising with a potential second Muslim representative on SACRE. Given the demographic composition of the borough, members felt it was important to have additional Muslim representation on Camden SACRE.

The Chair also said that he was attempting to communicate with members who had not attended recently, to encourage them to attend and, if they were regularly not able to, to let him know if they wished to stand down.

Members were informed by Jean Lang, Head of Primary School Improvement, that a Camden good practice website would be launched to help schools and teachers. Members asked that information about SACRE be added to it.

There was a discussion about the dates of future meetings. Members noted that some people had difficulties with attending a Tuesday evening meeting; however there was no alternative day of the week that would suit all attendees. It was also felt that holding meetings on different days of the week in different terms could be confusing so it was better to stick to Tuesday as the meeting day for all three meetings next year.

The dates of the meetings would be:

·         Tuesday, 14^th October 2014 at 5.30pm

·         Tuesday, 3^rd February 2015 at 5.30pm

·         Tuesday, 2^nd June 2015 at 5.30pm