THE Curriculum and Assessment Review: Interim report was published this month. While it was light on comment about religious education (RE), it is clear that there is now a window of opportunity for RE finally to be considered for inclusion as a core element of the National Curriculum.
RE does not form part of the National Curriculum, but schools are required by statute to provide it in England for children up to the age of 18. The lack of national agreed standards, however, means that there is wide disparity in the quality of provision, and a neglect of it, as reported in the 2024 Ofsted special report on RE (News, 19 April 2024). Including RE in the National Curriculum would ensure that RE was taken as seriously as all other core subjects, as well as becoming subject to statutory standards.
The situation is complex, because some schools have a religious designation anyway, and might wish to include additional faith-based content in their curricula. But there is a case for saying that all schools, whether faith-based or not, should be required to provide a nationally agreed religious curriculum that is both taught and assessed. Given the community-cohesion challenges that the UK faces, religious literacy will become increasingly vital for responsible citizenship.
I would argue that there are even more important reasons to make RE not only compulsory, but core. The mental-health crisis is particularly acute among school-age children. Too many young people feel no sense of hope, and feel overwhelmed by the burdens of our age.
For as long as we have had pictures, artefacts, and stories, we know that the human race has yearned for meaning and purpose, finding it most often down the ages through religion. The ancient religions and wisdom traditions have collected stories, honed practices, and gathered communities together to help humans to live well and thrive. Our own Christian tradition stands proudly in this global tradition, with a particular set of beliefs, liturgy, and practices of formation. These run through our nation and history like the letters in a stick of rock, and you have little chance of understanding either if you do not understand Christianity.
But, equally, you have no hope of making any sense of the Middle East if you do not understand Judaism and Islam; you cannot understand China or India without understanding their underlying belief systems; and you will not understand your own neighbours in this country if you have no idea about religious observance and practice.
THERE is more. As I have argued, we are entering uncharted territory with the emergence of artificial intelligence (AI) as a global co-intelligence (Comment, 1 September, 22 December 2023). Already, AI is writing essays, aceing exams, and taking on routine tasks that used to be the preserve of junior employees. Universities are already finding student-retention an emerging problem, as more and more students become unconvinced of the value of debt-funded degrees in an uncertain marketplace, and train-drivers and plumbers increasingly earn more than people with doctorates.
As more and more of the jobs that previously required a formal education become automated, the very point of traditional schooling is being thrown into question. This casts doubt on the purpose of trying hard at school, particularly when times are tough; and yet all the usual ways in which we have reinforced the virtues of study and discipline have been crowded to the periphery of school life, alluded to diffidently in the odd chapel service, because of a fear of offence.
I chair the Woodard Corporation, which is a family of schools committed to delivering education in a Christian context. The Church of England was running schools long before the State ever got involved; so there are thousands of schools up and down the country which are already committed to taking religion seriously.
Some within the Church of England feel that giving up the current separate statutory provision cedes ground to the competition, and it is true that a nationally agreed RE curriculum would have to give equal space to a range of world-views. Faith schools, of course, would be at liberty to supplement this with both instruction and formation.
IN THE UK, other faiths have often relied on the Church of England’s political leadership in many areas of common interest, and this is a golden opportunity for the Established Church to use its position to argue for the centrality of faith in education.
Putting RE on the core curriculum would mean that every child, regardless of background, would have the opportunity to learn about what drives the actions of those around them, and to understand the impact of beliefs on history, global politics, and different cultures. And, most importantly, they would have access to the scaffolding that they need to build their own sense of meaning and purpose, so that we might raise up a generation full of hope, ready to face the uncertain world that we are bequeathing to them.
Dr Eve Poole is Executive Chair of the Woodard Corporation and writes in a personal capacity.
