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Church welcome for Schools White Paper

25 October 2005

The Church of England’s chief education officer, Canon John Hall, has welcomed the Government’s invitation to the Church to establish local diocesan Trusts with the purpose of supporting some of those community or foundation schools which would move into the proposed Trust category under proposals in the Schools White Paper published today.

Canon Hall said: “The Church of England is committed to making the distinctively Christian and inclusive education our schools offer widely available as a response to parental demand.” The Church has been working steadily towards providing the 100 additional Church of England secondary schools recommended by Lord Dearing’s review of church schools in 2001.

These new Trust schools would not become Church of England schools but they would have a new relationship with the Church. “Each school has its own character,” Canon Hall said. “There are many community and foundation schools run clearly on Christian lines, with excellent collective worship and Religious Education, and supporting their pupils’ spiritual and moral development. It would be a privilege for the Church to be able to serve and support such schools.”

Asked whether the Church of England would set a target for the number of Trust schools, Canon Hall said, “The choice whether to establish such a Trust will be for each diocese, just as the decision whether to become affiliated in that way will be for each school to make.

Personally I believe strongly in the value of a Church of England education and would like to see significant numbers.”

Canon Hall also welcomed the Government’s proposal in the White Paper that Voluntary Controlled schools should be encouraged to transfer to the Trust category. Where they were already Church of England schools, they would have greater freedom to develop their ethos as church schools.

Church of England dioceses have a strong strategic partnership with Local Authorities and will remain committed to working closely with them as they continue together to support improving standards of education for all.

 

Notes

44 new Church of England secondary schools have already opened since 2001 or are scheduled to open (including 8 Academies). There are 53 more projects under discussion (including 25 Academies). They too will be Church of England schools.

Roughly 1 in 4 primary schools in England is a Church of England school but only 1 in 20 secondary schools.

The ‘Dearing 100’ additional schools will bring the Church of England’s secondary provision to no more than 7.5%. Many communities will remain without Church of England secondary provision. If there were 200 affiliated Trust schools, the proportion of secondary schools provided by or associated with the Church of England would reach 10%, equivalent to the proportion of Roman Catholic secondary schools.

Of the existing 4,700 Church of England schools, more than half are Voluntary Controlled, i.e. with a Local Authority admissions policy, a minority of the governing body appointed by the Church, and all staff employed by the Local Authority. There are fewer than 50 Church of England Foundation schools. The rest, Voluntary Aided schools, have a majority of the governing body appointed by the Church, make their own decisions about admissions, and employ their own teachers.

The overwhelming majority of Voluntary Controlled schools are Church of England schools. The Church will be consulting on a proposal that the Voluntary Controlled category should be merged with the new Trust category of schools.