Standing Advisory Council on Religious Education - school website monitoring

Last year, we launched a new Kent Agreed Syllabus, which we have had excellent feedback on.

During the last 6 months we have been monitoring the websites of Kent schools to see if Religious Education is referenced, the arrangements for collective worship and whether the new Kent Agreed Syllabus 2018 is mentioned. This is so that we can carry out our responsibility and as a result of the new Ofsted orders which will be looking for a broad and balanced curriculum. We know that the trials have included inspecting provision for Religious Education.

The law still stands that all pupils must be taught Religious Education, unless withdrawn by their parents on grounds of religious conscience and that there should be an act of collective worship each day in schools. This law applies to all schools whether an academy or state maintained. The recommended time for teaching is 5% of teaching time during the year (which equates 50 minutes in KS1; and 1 hour and 10 minutes in KS2). The time for collective worship is separate from and in addition to this.

So far, we have checked on just over half of the websites of Kent schools and the results have been quite interesting. Some websites are very out of date, about 75% mention RE and 25% don’t mention which syllabus is being used, while less than half mention provision for collective worship. The time allotted to teaching Religious Education is barely mentioned. We have also seen some very impressive websites with comprehensive information on the curriculum and school activities. We are writing to suggest that you might want to consider whether your website has all the information that we have been looking for.

Also, to let you know that there are a series of courses on 20 March. In case you missed the launch of the new syllabus there is a mini rerun of the launch in the morning and in the afternoon a course on providing excellent creative RE for the Primary school. There is also a twilight session for the Secondary schools on ideas for excellent RE. Kent SACRE is bearing most of the costs of these, so each session is £15 to attend with teachers who want to come to the whole day being charged £25.

We would also like to draw your attention to the SACRE page where there are several guidance documents for teachers of RE and information on how you can access a digital copy of the syllabus. If you would like any advice or guidance on Religious Education please contact the RE Consultant for Kent SACRE, pennysmithorr@gmail.com.

Contact Details

Penny Smith-Orr
Email: pennysmithorr@gmail.com