Creation of curricular havoc

IN THE course of researching last week’s column — focused on public discussion of faith-related school issues and the elusive concept of “British values” — an academic colleague drew my attention to an under-reported initiative emanating from the desk of education secretary Michael Gove. The policy underpinning this initiative must affect all Jewish educators in this country.

In the wake of the media frenzy that accompanied the story of an alleged plot to “Islamise” certain state-funded secular schools in Birmingham (and possibly Bradford), Gove’s department took the decision to promulgate new rules governing the funding of “academy” and “free” schools.

For the benefit of those of you not quite up to speed on these matters, I should explain that an academy is a state school funded directly by Gove’s department rather than by a local authority. A “free” school is an academy that has not been built to replace an existing school, but is newly established; such schools are also funded directly by the DoE.

There are at the moment a small number of Jewish academy schools, including the Independent Jewish Day School (Hendon) and the Jewish Cassel Fox school (Broughton).

When the concept of an academy school was first mooted — by the Labour government of Tony Blair some 15 years ago — much was made of the fact that, in such schools, the governing bodies and head-teachers were going to have much greater freedom in matters pertaining to the curriculum.

Not any more. At the beginning of this month, the DoE published on its website a series of “model agreements” pertaining to the setting up and funding of academy and free schools; although, strictly speaking, these templates apply only to new schools, the consensus is that the Department will expect all existing academies to adhere to the principles that are embodied in them.

I should warn those of you minded to peruse the templates that they do not make for easy reading. So let me draw your attention to just two sections of the principal model agreement. Section 2.44 stipulates that an academy “must not allow any view or theory to be taught as evidence-based if it is contrary to established scientific or historical evidence and explanations.” “This clause [the template explains] applies to all subjects [my emphasis] taught at the Academy.” And section 2.45 enjoins that an academy “must provide for the teaching of evolution as a comprehensive, coherent and extensively evidenced theory.”

Let me deal with the second of these sections first.

It is of course aimed at “creationism” — the belief, grounded in the Book of Genesis, that the universe originated in an act or acts of divine creation. Now we can certainly argue about whether creationism can be reconciled with the theory of evolution. But actually we don’t need to. Because what the experts tell me, what the British Humanist Association and other opponents of faith-based education are

There is no such thing as an ‘established’ historical explanation

naturally trumpeting, and what we must conclude from any commonsense reading of section 2.45, is that it means and can only mean that “creationism” cannot be taught as a valid theory in any academy school.

Indeed, in an explanatory note, the government says as much: “the requirement on every academy… school to provide a broad and balanced curriculum … prevents the teaching of creationism as evidence-based theory.” This must surely impact upon the supposed freedom of Jewish academies to offer an education grounded in their underlying religious faith.

The purport of section 2.44 is — if anything — still more pernicious. It opens the door to financial and even criminal sanctions should any mischief-maker challenge the teaching of a particular historical event (never mind creationism) in any academy school. This is breathtaking, because there is no such thing as an “established” historical explanation. If a Jewish academy teaches the “view” that Arabs were not expelled from Israel in 1948-49, but left of their own accord, I’m bound to ask whether this could put its state funding at risk on the grounds that such teaching contradicts explanations offered in some historical writings.

These new rules (which include a totally nebulous reference to “fundamental British values”) do not currently apply to faith schools that are not academies.

But the BHA has informed me that, because taxpayer-funded faith schools are nonetheless obliged to teach “a broad and balanced curriculum,” it presumes that Michael Gove’s department would regard the teaching of creationism at any such school as a breach of this legal requirement.

I hope this is not true. But I cannot be sure.