Agenda item

To receive a report from the Director of Children’s Services providing an update on national engagement, research and other matters, and to welcome Dr Farid Panjwani, one of the REC Commissioners, to give a short presentation on the Commission on RE and receive questions from SACRE.

The Council received a report from Patricia Hannam and Justine Ball, the County inspector/advisors on national and local RE matters and then received a short presentation from Dr Farid Panjwani, one of the RE Commission commissioners. (Item 9 in the minute book)

Patricia Hannam indicated that she had recently attended the NASACRE AGM on SACRE’s behalf, together with Elizabeth Jenkerson and Sushma Sahajpal who were both on the NASACRE executive.  She had also attended the Religious Education Council AGM through her role on the AREIAC Executive Council.  Both of these had been most informative days. SACRE members were encouraged to consider attending the NASACRE AGM next year, which will most likely be in London .

Members were informed that in a desire to keep the Hampshire Interfaith Calendar and Lecture going, they were to be managed by the RE advisers.  Twelve schools had submitted artwork which had been judged.  The calendar will be launched on 14 November 2017 and will be followed by an interfaith seminar.  SACRE members were encouraged to attend.  Please contact Pat Hannam  with expressions of interest, following which a formal invitation will be sent from the organisers

Justine Ball informed Members that the Hampshire Advice Document for schools had been finalised and would be distributed to schools shortly.  She thanked those Members who had contributed or commented on it. It is intended that this document will be amended, added to and extended as required.

Justine Ball provided Members with an overview of the initial findings of the annual withdrawal survey.  144 schools had responded, which was felt to be a good number (29%) representing 46,158 children in a range of educational establishments.  Of these 16 children had been withdrawn from all RE and 23 from part.  Reasons were that the teaching was in conflict with their own faith, such as Jehovah’s Witnesses and Plymouth Brethren, and a few withdrawing from Mosque visits.  This was slightly less than last year. 15 children had been withdrawn from all Collective Worship and 43 from part of it.  Reasons included going to a church service or nativity or some other special event.    It was noted that there was no ‘do you do collective worship?’ question on the survey.  The inspectors indicated that information from training courses suggested that primary schools do have collective worship, but would like to improve them, and that with secondary schools it is very variable.  Justine Ball agreed to look further at the breakdown between primary and secondary schools on both withdrawal and collective worship.  It was noted that Ofsted are not taking a hard line on secondary collective worship.

The Chairman invited Dr Farid Panjwani, one of the RE Commission commissioners to speak about the Commission and its discussions.  Dr Panjwani thanked SACRE for inviting to him and indicated that this was the first time he had attended a SACRE meeting.

Dr Panjwani indicated that the Commission was looking at what factors make RE work, or not, in schools, and noted that collective worship was not part of the remit of the Commission.  He received comments from Members about the quality and number of RE teachers and whether there should be a ‘common entitlement’ to RE.  The status of the subject and its teaching was being looked at.

Members informed the commissioner that they felt that RE in Hampshire was effective because the local authority puts money into having two RE advisers and running a school improvement service (HIAS), teachers are, therefore, well-supported with continuing professional training and networking opportunities.  In addition to this, funding is provided by the Local Authority for the Advisers to support SACRE and also fund up to 10 half day monitoring visits to schools with SACRE members; therefore enabling SACRE to fulfil its statutory duties.  The Agreed Syllabus was also mentioned in the context of effective RE in Hampshire; the key to the Syllabus was in its educative value, which  encourages students to question, form and express views, rather than solely being in a proscriptive rut of factual learning. The Commission would investigate how to ensure that students were able to form an informed opinion.

RESOLVED:

·         That SACRE thanked Dr Farid Panjwani for his presentation.

·         The SACRE noted the report