Council and councillors

For the group to review the 2018/19 development plan and suggest items to be included in the 2019/20 plan.

During discussion the following comments were noted:

·         Mr Singh in his emailed comments to the Chair, had requested that SACRE consider each strategy in turn and ask themselves “how did the child benefit from the work on this area?” .It should then focus most of its energies where the child benefited most.

·         The Plan should be clearer on how success was measured.

Management of SACRE and partnership with the Local Authority

·         The partnership between the Local Authority and SACRE was a statutory requirement.

·         Members questioned whether management of the committee should include monitoring attendance and representation.

·         The Committee agreed that there should be an additional column to the Plan, headed Outcomes, which would enable SACRE to monitor success.

Effectiveness of Locally Agreed Syllabus

·         Reverend Holmes shared with the group a hard copy of the syllabus that was now available from the Diocese of Peterborough.

·         The Peterborough syllabus was not an agreed syllabus and differed from the syllabus which every SACRE had and that lasted for five years.

·         Not all the major religions and world views were taught at the different Key Stages.

·         Assessing effectiveness was subjective unless specific measures such as GCSE or A level take-up were used.

·         Members suggested that the strategy heading “Effectiveness of Locally Agreed Syllabus” should be replaced with the “Effectiveness of Cross-Curriculum Links”.

To engage all Rutland schools with SACRE and promote sharing of good practice and standing RE

·         Engagement with Rutland schools was critical and should be the main focus of SACRE

·         RE had been promoted as part of the wider curriculum in Rutland schools by integrating RE into the Council’s promoting literacy project.

·         Council educational initiatives were open to all schools, regardless of whether they were academies or not. All 17 Rutland primary schools had engaged with the literacy project and all attendees had been recorded.

·         A pupil voice conference for the children of service families had been an opportunity to engage with schools to think about their curriculum.

·         In contrast to OFSTED, the Council were not notified about the release of any SIAMS (School Inspection Anglican and Methodist Schools) reports and would have to go looking for the information. 

·         Schools had requested more information on other religions and how they linked to the history curriculum; for example the Sikhs who fought in WW1

Put together a list of Visits and Visitors for all schools to help promote community cohesion and understanding of different faiths.

·         Rather than having just a list of providers, it would be more useful to monitor and review the number of visits by representatives of the different faiths.

Review of Collective Worship

·         There was confusion between what should be covered in a collective worship and how that differed from material covered in an RE lesson.

·         Schools often asked for additional materials for their collective worship.

·         Most secondary schools did not have collective worship.

·         The theme of a collective worship should be considered in the context of what was happening at school at that time.

·         Humanists did not like the term ‘collective worship’ and preferred the term ‘assemblies’.

·         Members were asked to consider what they could do as a SACRE group to provide materials for a collective worship that brought the whole school together.

·         It was highlighted that children could be withdrawn from a collective worship but not from an assembly.

RESOLVED:

1.    The Chair would circulate to the Committee a revised draft of the Development Plan based on the discussion at the meeting and invite further comment from members.

2.    The Committee unanimously agreed that the Development Plan should cover a period of two years from 2019-2021.