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Religion in the Classroom

Tuesday, 25 May 10

Overview

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Is there still room for God in the classroom?

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There's an upheaval happening in the teaching of religion in NSW's public primary schools.
 
For more than 100 years more church leaders and volunteers have given religious instruction to primary school kids in public schools across Australia.

This goes right back to legislation put in place in 1880.
 
But for the kids whose parents don't want them to receive the religious instruction on offer, they often find themselves watching videos, colouring in or as some have put it 'twiddling their thumbs".
 
Parents have asked for a more productive alternative.
 
Currently in NSW, 10 primary schools are trialling a 10 week "ethics class” as an alternative to religious instruction.
 
Sydney Anglican Archbishop Peter Jensen has come out strongly against it and penned “10 reasons the Ethics Trial is not a good idea’’.  The Catholic Church has said children who opt out shouldn’t be involved in any kind of formal class.

The Anglicans reported that they lost 47 per cent of their religious classes to the ethics trial and they are not happy. They have joined with other Christian churches and launched a petition to save their scripture classes.

Given that Australia is a secular country and home to people of many faiths, what religious education is appropriate in public schools?  

Insight brings together parents, children and faith leaders to discuss how religion should be taught in our public schools and whether there’s still room for God in 2010.


Meet the Guests

  • Angela Robertson

    Angela is a mother of two from Sydney and is  one of the volunteer ethics teachers at Crown Street Public School. Crown Street Public is one of 10 primary schools in NSW that is part of a trial where kids who don’t go to scripture class learn ethics instead. Angela says it breaks her heart that there is no alternative for children who don’t do scripture.

  • Bishop Glenn Davies

    Dr. Glenn Davies is the Anglican Bishop of North Sydney. Glenn is against the ethics trial because he thinks it should be covered in the main curriculum. He thinks that the NSW government has been unethical letting this trial go ahead.

  • Mazen Fahme

    Mazen Fahme organises Islamic Special Religious Education in NSW. Mazen says there are 20,000 kids being taught Islamic scripture at the moment but currently demand still outstrips supply.

  • Lheana Gavagna

    Lheana is a mother of two from Canberra, ACT. After two and half years teaching ‘World Religions and Beliefs’ to the non-religious students at her kids’ school, Lheana says she was shut down by the Department of Education NSW because she was not part of an authorised religious group.

  • Shizuka Stack-Tago

    Shizuka is in Year 6 at Crown Street Public School and is in the ethics class being trialled at her school. Shizuka says she likes the ethics class because it relates to real life situations and she gets to have a say.

  • Ann Maree Whenman

    Ann Maree represents the Catholic Church as well as being the chair of ICCOREIS – the body which oversees Christian religious education in government schools in NSW. Both ICCOREIS and the Catholic Church are opposed to the Ethics class trial. Ann Maree believes a suitable alternative should be found for those children who opt out of scripture but that it should not be a formal class and it should not be ethics.

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