By Ruth Peacock
A campaign to attract a new generation of religious education teachers has been launched by a number of teaching organisations after applications plummeted by a third this year.
All applications for teacher training fell by 22 per cent, but the decline for RE is worse.
In a Religion Media Centre briefing, Dr Kathryn Wright, chief executive of Culham St Gabriel’s Trust, listed the reasons:
- Workload
- Pay not keeping pace with inflation
- A crisis in middle leadership roles with large numbers — especially women — leaving between the ages of 30 and 39
- Lack of flexible working opportunities
- Lack of a bursary to help with student fees
- And a third of teachers leaving within five years.
Culham St Gabriel’s is lobbying around these issues and has held meetings with the Department for Education sharing concerns.
Dr Wright suggested that another reason for teacher shortages specific to RE is the myth that specialist teachers had to have a degree in theology or religious studies, whereas RE teacher training is open to students with a wide variety of first degree subjects.
Heather Murray, associate tutor in religious education at Edge Hill University, Liverpool, suggested other factors. In contrast with other parts of the curriculum, would-be RE teachers know they will have to fight for their subject to be on the timetable in many schools, although it is compulsory for all children until they finish school or college.
And, she said, there was a historical misconception that RE was about making young people religious or teaching Christian ethos.
RE is much broader in scope and deeper in intention now, with a growing movement to rename it “religion and worldviews”. Ms Williams said young people were starting to value it more but school systems had not caught up with the changes.
The campaign, Beyond the Ordinary, emphasises that RE helps young people move into a world where they must navigate complex and challenging situations dealing with different perspectives, Dr Wright said.
Research shows that the public value religious education, believing it ensures that children are equipped for the modern world, respectful, open and well informed. And latest statistics suggest that pupils value the subject too, with the numbers taking GCSE and A-level growing over the past 10 years.
Ads focused for social media will emphasise these messages, aiming to attract new graduates and older people looking for a career change.
Dr Tim Hutchings, assistant professor in religious ethics at Nottingham University, explained the breadth of the subject. There was, he said, a broad spectrum of subjects at A-level that were useful when studying religion, and after graduation, there were even broader areas of work possibilities, from international relations to journalism.
He said only 10 per cent of theology and religious studies graduates taught RE: “Maybe what we’re what we’re missing sometimes is that we need to say teaching other people religious literacy, RE and ethics in schools is also a really important task.”
The shortfall means that 25 per cent of all RE lessons are taught by teachers with no post A-level qualification in the subject: 51 per cent of RE teachers are mainly teaching another subject as their primary focus.
Catherine Hughes, chair of SACRE at St Helens, Merseyside, explained that her team, as was common in secondary schools, included teachers who specialised in other subjects. There were two issues: one was ensuring that teachers had sufficient time for more than one subject; and the other was to ensure subject knowledge.
The perception was that you had to be religious to teach, but she said: “I’m just trying to get them to be the Good Samaritan and to explore their own faith in a safe environment.
“I do actually think it’s the best job in the world. I am privileged to be in on the journey of faith and help young people get the skills to interact with people around them in the world and make a positive contribution”.
Ms Murray said her student teachers were passionate advocates for RE and often they came into the profession because they had a great RE teacher who brought the subject alive.
Dr Hutchings suggested that theology and religious studies departments could include modules on how to teach religion, as part of their degree programme. Including religion as part of a degree in history or sociology, for example, could also encourage students to see how religion fitted in to wider academic study.
One outcome of the shortage is that local religious leaders are being invited into schools more frequently to explain their faith. Deepak Naik, chief executive of Together in Action Coventry, said his requests from schools to talk about Hinduism had increased substantially. He said community leaders were a great resource for schools and opportunities could be maximised. For him, it was important that RE teachers should have some feeling towards the sacred, not just an understanding of belief.
Dr Jasjit Singh from Leeds University is embarking on a project to consider rules of best practice when representatives from faith groups go into schools. The question of who represented a minority tradition was important, he said: “Because if that’s the only experience the pupils get with somebody from that tradition, then it needs to be a reasonable quality otherwise you can often do more damage if the wrong kind of thing is said.”
For Dr Wright this was a compelling argument for ensuring the provision of qualified RE teachers: “Having well-qualified specialist teachers is almost more important when you’re engaging with people from different faith and belief communities, because you need to know where to go and you need to know how to have those conversations.”
To view the briefing again, go to our YouTube channel https://youtu.be/I0BzBq3TT3k
