The August 2020 update to the Education and Training Act requires state primary and intermediate schools to enforce an opt-in process for religious instruction.

So SEN member Tanya Jacob will not be proceeding with her planned High Court case against the Attorney General in October.

The court case, along with persistent media attention and Human Rights complaints, motivated a change to religious instruction in the Bill.

The Secular Education Network (SEN) was the group behind the move to ban religious teaching in schools.

Spokesperson Mark Honeychurch says that SEN is relieved the government has finally ensured that parents and caregivers should be made aware of any church-led religious instruction their child is receiving.

But whether this happens in practice is up to individual schools.

"The content of the church-led religious instruction 'classes' is not curriculum-based, but young children are incapable of recognising the difference.

To children, what is taught at school is fact.

It is up to us responsible adults in their lives to ensure that evangelism doesn't take place in class time," Honeychurch said.

However, SEN group member David Hines felt the opt-in did not go far enough and said in a separate statement he felt Jacob had "dropped the ball, with the finish line in sight."

"Tanya and I had this wider target in mind when we began our campaign.

It is distressing to see her now accepting a lower target and a campaign dragging on for further years."

"The petition objects only to religious instruction. The court case had a far wider target," Hines said.

"It included: religious observances (such as hymns in school assemblies), chaplains in schools, Christian youth workers, discrimination in secondary schools, Christianised karakia, and a broader definition of what secular education means."

Source

• stuff.co.nz
• scoop.co.nz
• Image: cathnews.co.nz

The survey was launched last week by an independent charity, the Religious Diversity Centre (RDC), in partnership with the Ministry of Education.

The survey asks whether "religious instruction" in state primary schools should be replaced by "neutral teaching" about world religions.

On its website, the RDC says its mission is to "foster appreciation, understanding and deeper relationships among the religious, spiritual and secular communities in Aotearoa New Zealand, and provide an independent and informed voice on religious and spiritual issues in the public sphere."

In the introduction to the survey, a distinction is made between religious instruction and religious studies.

Religious instruction is defined as being designed to prepare or encourage student participation in the religion in which they are being taught.

Religious education is defined as being designed to teach about religions from a faith-neutral perspective to foster an understanding of what people believe and do, and why.

Launchpad chief executive Geoff Burton, denies that it "prepares" or "encourages" students to participate in Christianity.

Launchpad was formerly known as the Churches Education Commission which runs religious instruction in about 550 state schools.

The Secular Education Network (SEN) spokesman David Hines, also objected to the questions in the survey.

"Members who have read the questionnaire are concerned that it does not distinguish between primary and secondary schools. Some would support religious studies in state secondary schools, but not in state primary schools," he said.

Click here to participate in the survey

Source

• nzherald.co.nz
• rdc.org.nz
• qualtrics.com

They say the Education and Workforce Committee's report to the House of Parliament last week on the Education and Training Bill: "sanctions bible classes for primary school children in state primary schools, even though the new bill, like previous laws, states that schools must be secular."

The proposed Bill amends the 1964 Education Act's provisions regarding religious instruction.

Section 54 retains the provision that "if a State school's board, after consultation with the principal, determines school buildings may be used for the purposes of religious instruction or observances conducted in a manner approved by the board."

The section states that "any 1 or more classrooms at the school, or the school as a whole, may be closed during the school day for any period or periods not exceeding 60 minutes in aggregate in any week or 20 hours in a school year, for the purposes of religious instruction or observances conducted by voluntary instructors approved by the school's board."

Currently, an opt-out approach applies.

But the new law makes provision for an opt-in provision to ensure that attendance at religious instruction only occurs with parental consent.

Secular Education Network spokesperson, Mark Honeychurch, says that the change does not go far enough.

He says it is a discriminatory and outdated law and it must be changed.

The Secular Education Network is also taking the Attorney General, representing the Ministry of Education, to court in October, arguing that provision of religious instruction in state schools is discriminatory.

Sections 54 to 58 of Bill apply to religious instruction and observances in State primary and intermediate schools only.

Source

• legislation.govt.nz
• scoop.co.nz

Hogg kept her 7-year-old son home from school last week to avoid lessons about the Christian origins of Christmas.

She said she was unhappy her son's class was being asked to act out the nativity and take part in discussions about Jesus, Mary and Joseph.

So on Wednesday, her son stayed home from Stanmore Bay School in the north Auckland suburb of Whangaparaoa.

Her son didn't want to join in the activities because he didn't believe in God, but he was "upset" by the only other alternative - going to another classroom.

Hogg said the saga started when her son had a schoolyard debate about who Christmas presents came from - his parents or Santa.

He came home upset after a teacher told him off, Hogg said.

In a letter to the principal, she said it was "awfully hypocritical" for her son to be told to keep his beliefs to himself, only for the school to offer a forum for Christian students to discuss their beliefs about Christmas.

"While it is absolutely fine for children to hold their own discussions on Santa and religion on the playground, it should not be teacher-led within the classroom," she wrote.

Stanmore Bay School principal Matt Sides said the school was looking into the concerns raised.

"The intention of this whanau (team of learners) has been teaching traditional stories, myths and legends across the term," he said.

Under the draft Ministry of Education guidelines, primary and intermediate schools will have to ask families for their consent to give religious instruction and would have to provide alternatives for those who refuse.

The Secular Education Network (SEN) applauded Hogg's stand, but faith leaders expressed disappointment.

Source

• stuff.co.nz
• newstalkzb.co.nz
• Image youtube.com

"The proceedings were originally filed with the Human Rights Review Tribunal in October 2016 and little substantive progress has been made since then," the spokesperson said. Read more

Tanya Jacob, the South Island representative of the of the Secular Education Network (SEN), said there are "really quite serious concerns, even concerns about potential for grooming, keeping secrets with children that they're not allowed to go home and tell their parents".

Asked is it scaremongering to use the word grooming, she said: "I think it's accurate, whether it's religious grooming or potential for other sorts of grooming."

CEC teaches in around 600 schools and says its lessons focus on Bible stories and teaching life values.

A spokeswoman, Abbey Reeve, said Jacob's statement was "really inflaming stuff that parents would be very scared about. But it's not true, there is none of this keeping of secrets, there's none of this hiding stuff".

Another spokeswoman for CEC, Tracey Kirkley, said SEN's claims were "not at all consistent" with current Religious Education programmes. The content they were protesting about stopped being taught in New Zealand schools some eight years ago.

Three members of SEN were handing out pamphlets outside Wharenui School in Riccarton on Wednesday.

The pamphlets show a picture of a little girl simulating choking herself.

The group said this was an illustration of an exercise children are asked to do as an example of what happens to non-believers.

However, pastor Phil Stedman from the church providing the lessons denied children had ever been asked to do this.

"I have no idea what it's about, to be honest. We would never in our wildest dreams go anywhere near using a story like that. And I think that is a complete misrepresentation of the sort of thing we teach."

Stedman said while he believed in hell, this was not something children were taught about.

Watch: 'There are no secrets' - parents and church clash over religious education in schools

Source

• TVNZ
• RNZ
• Stuff
• Image: Stuff

The survey received 1663 responses from a total of 1833 state primary and intermediate schools.

The SEN website has a resource that shows which schools received the survey and which of them responded to it. Read more

David Hines, spokesperson for SEN, has been described in the media as a"retired Journalist and lay preacher.

An introduction to a 2012 YouTube video says Hines

• Was a Methodist minister for 10 years, from 1961.
• He resigned and became a journalist, but continued lay preaching.
• Around 1986 he became a Christian atheist, led a church youth group
• And he worked for the Catholic newspaper, Zealandia.
• About 2006 he started lay preaching again.

In a 2014 interview with Danielle Street posted on VICE Hines described himself as a Christian Atheist

"Well, my own beliefs are quite weird. I'm a Christian-Atheist and I'm a lay preacher.

So I've been a Christian all my life, but since I was 21 I've come at it from a secular angle.

I don't believe in the legendary stuff, but I still believe in the rest of it—the values and so on.

In the interview Hines said "When I was gathering comments against the Bible in Schools programme more Christians came and declared themselves against it than Atheists."

In its appeal to the Human Rights Commission SEN will be claiming that section 78 of the Education Act 1964 - which permitted the programmes - is inconsistent with the Bill of Rights Act.

The case also states that the Education Act 1989 permitted biased teaching about religions and non-religious beliefs in social studies and other classes, and stopped the Ministry of Education from monitoring it or taking action.

The Churches Education Commission (CEC), which runs Bible in Schools in many state schools, has also been accepted as an interested non-party with a right to present evidence.

CEC claim that their classes are suitable for non-religious students and that they support the New Zealand curriculum.

In 2015 Victoria University religious studies professor Paul Morris Morris reviewed two of the CEC courses.

Among other things he concluded that the teaching materials were "at odds with the diverse demography of our country where nationally a minority are Christian and an even smaller minority are conservative evangelical Christians".

Source

• radionz.co.nz
• youtube.com
• vice.com
• religioninschools.co.nz
• nzherald.co.nz
• nzherald.co.nz
• stuff.co.nz
• religiouseducation.co.nz
• Image: vice.com

The Network says any influence of the church on the education material meant a "biased education" was being delivered.

Registered charity Rule Education Trust, run by David Rule, is delivering driver licence courses to Aucklanders in need.

Rule set up the not for-profit trust in 2002 and has since launched courses in more than 15 locations across Auckland, including marae, decile 1 schools, community centres and prisons.

He has been a Scientologist for 30 years.

Rule once taught Scientology's Applied Scholastics programmes alongside Auckland social worker Betty Wark.

Applied Scholastics International teaches study skills developed by the church's founder L Ron Hubbard.

Rule said he believed in the education technology and while he did not teach these study skills or any religious material during the driver licence courses, he did draw on what he had learned in his time teaching Applied Scholastics.

The techniques include making sure students understand the meanings of words, encouraging them to physically interact with what they are learning about and not teaching too much too soon.

Last year more than 1000 people enrolled in the driver licence courses and about 200 people across the region were currently attending classes.

About half the people enrolled in the courses were referred by organisations like police and Work and Income (WINZ).

The success rate was sitting at about 75 per cent for the community and prison classes and more than 95 per cent in high schools.

Source

• Stuff.co.nz
• Image: Stuff.co.nz

Christchurch mother Tanya Jacob and the Secular Education Network are pressing for changes to the law in this regard.

They have laid a complaint with the Human Rights Commission.

Ms Jacob said her son felt discriminated against and was made to wash dishes when he opted out of religious instruction at his school.

Section 78 of the Education Act, 1964, allows up to one hour a week or 20 hours a year of religious instruction in state schools, at times when the school is deemed to be closed.

This has to be approved by the school's board of trustees after consultation with their principal.

Stuff.co.nz reported Ms Parata saying that if parents don't want to have their children going to a school that offers religious instruction, then they can choose another school.

Christianity was where New Zealand's "traditional history" came from, she said.

"The country as a whole at a public national level still has a view about the place of that in our society."

Ms Parata predicted the role of religion in education could eventually change, as the population "decides that that is what it wants to happen".

The majority of schools would have to have a problem in this area, before she would consider any kind of review.

Labour education spokesman Chris Hipkins said religion in schools was a "vexed area" and he would be open to a review.

A SEN survey that gained 1663 responses from 1833 New Zealand state primary and intermediate schools found that 37.7 per cent offered religious instruction.

Some schools are adopting an "opt-in" approach for religious instruction, rather than the traditional "opt-out" approach, to avoid controversy.

Sources

• Stuff.co.nz
• The Press
• Education Act section 78
• Image: Radio Live