London, England - The Department of Education and Skills, Dfes, has approved a state-funded Hindu school in Harrow. They accepted a bid from the I-Foundation/Iskcon group, though the Swami Narayan and the Saibaba foundation had applied also. Swami Narayan already run a very successful private school, but Iskcon Bhaktivedanta Manor, a Hare Krishna missionary sect of Hinduism, were at a loss in trying to ensure their children learn the Iskcon philosophy first-hand in their own school.
A report in the Monitor said the problem of segregation, albeit in a very mild form, is apparent only when a particular faith school starts teaching a very hard line of exclusivity, a sort of monopoly on God for those who follow that path. In Hinduism there is very little danger of that, as Hinduism itself is a synthesis of several schools of thought, several divine revelations, several deities, even though the underlying spirituality is one God, Brahman.
The move towards a multi-faith society in our global village is inevitable. The challenge is to reconcile the different and sometimes mutually exclusive strands in religions to a point where we can at least learn to live together. We cannot brush away the very real problems of faith under the carpet as otherwise from time to time they do escape, only to clash in front of our faces. That does not mean that we should censure faith itself, or that faith itself divides and leads to segregation. It is certain strands of faith that can be dangerous and it is those that we need to work upon to eliminate, or at least to bear a process of reconciliation with.
The value of faith schools in terms of academic achievements and pupils with strong moral values cannot be argued against. Academically they do so well because they have mainly stuck to the traditional teaching methods along with the old grading structures of classes. Moral values would outweigh any mild form of segregation tendencies but, nonetheless, any form of segregation, we need to take seriously and work upon.
The Government is trying to bring several faith schools under a regulatory regime where certain minimum standards are observed, by making them state-owned. The Dfes issued last year a non-statutory national framework for religious education (RE) in schools. This framework is constructed with a view to promoting multi-faith and pluralistic concepts. Although the local SACRE's set the RE syllabus for the schools in each locality, the national framework suggests that children should be made aware of all faiths.
Single faith schools can retain their commitment to their faith, but it is right that in this world today the children are prepared adequately to have some knowledge of all the other faiths. It will help negate prejudices, complexes and indeed any fears of segregation. Perhaps in time we could see a wider mix of teachers in faith schools where a single faith school would employ at least 25% of its teachers from other faiths, to ensure that the children do get that extra exposure, in a proper manner, before they move into the real world.