Qualifying to get into a church school

Counting_Pennies_2

Can anyone help me on this matter?

I go to the family service once a month at my local church and have recently started taking my son to a toddler session in the church once a week.

My husband, myself and my son are all Christened.

Is that sufficient qualification for being considered in the top category to get into a school that is of the same faith, or do I have to do something else?

Thanks

Gingham_Ribbon

No. You need to be in the parish and attend regular services. (That's what it's like here anyway.)

emmaroids

i would send him to a normal school, at least until he is old enough to make his own mind up about going to a church school or normal school.

seven-day-weekend

My son always went to Church Schools.

At his Primary school it was mainly based upon living in the Parish, but at his Secondary School, which was very oversubscribed, you had to not only be a regular worshipper but also have a letter of reference from your Vicar/Minister/Church Leader. This was a C of E School, although they took children from other Christian families.

However, just being in the parish and being christened would not have put you in the top flight for inclusion. I know many nominal Christians who were turned away. What the school were looking for was comitment.

(They did have a number of places for non-Christians too, but even these had to demonstrate a willigness to be educated in the Christian faith, or at the very least not to mind).

shykins

we were the same as u family serv ice and church toddlers

when it came to school time i applied to the church school in the nearby town and my vicar happily signed the letter for me.... the schools catchment was their town then surrounding villages worshippers.. i think the letter from my vicar helped as he got a place there

in the end we didnt take it up for various reasons.. my advice would be to discuss it with the school and/or your vicar so u know where ustand for the future

good luck

chmmy

I believe each school will have their own specific criteria, so it would be worth getting a prospectus which will state the admissions criteria from each of the schools that you are interested in.

Just call them all or email them, they wont have next years one ready yet as they have recently gone through the primary admissions and the offers actually go out on Tuesday in my area, but they should be able to give you this years one. The more info you have, the better prepared you will be when it's your turn to apply.

Spendless

All the church schools here have their own individual criteria, our nearest 1st one is siblings, another might be children of that parish, or worshipping at that church, followed by worshiping at another church. You need to get the info from the school you are interested in.

Savvy_Sue

As others have said, each school will have their own criteria, and the other thing to be aware of is that it may change over time! For example, when we moved here and wanted to apply for DS1 to get into his current secondary, you weren't likely to get a place unless both you and the child had been in church (and that meant on a Sunday, not a church based activity group like cubs) every WEEK for at least 2 years. And we had to get a form signed by our minister to confirm this.

3 years later and that was every week for at least 4 years! Because we hadn't been at the same church for that long, we had to get a form signed by our current minister, and by our previous minister.

Someone at work asked me how they'd get their child (then aged 2) into that secondary school, and I said "Start going to church NOW, every week, with your child." They weren't sure they could do that 'just' to get a school place, and I agreed that I wouldn't have been able to do it either, but as it happened the 'going to church' thing was something we were doing anyway!

With the Catholic Junior we sent DS1 to, 'the unbaptised' officially came at the bottom of the admissions priority, so I did explain that in our church we didn't splash water on babies, but he had had a service of naming and blessing, which they accepted as equivalent. They changed the wording of that policy within a year or two as well, to give families of unbaptised children attending church a higher priority than families not attending church at all ...

seven-day-weekend

Savvy_Sue wrote: »

As others have said, each school will have their own criteria, and the other thing to be aware of is that it may change over time! For example, when we moved here and wanted to apply for DS1 to get into his current secondary, you weren't likely to get a place unless both you and the child had been in church (and that meant on a Sunday, not a church based activity group like cubs) every WEEK for at least 2 years. And we had to get a form signed by our minister to confirm this.

3 years later and that was every week for at least 4 years! Because we hadn't been at the same church for that long, we had to get a form signed by our current minister, and by our previous minister.

Someone at work asked me how they'd get their child (then aged 2) into that secondary school, and I said "Start going to church NOW, every week, with your child." They weren't sure they could do that 'just' to get a school place, and I agreed that I wouldn't have been able to do it either, but as it happened the 'going to church' thing was something we were doing anyway!

With the Catholic Junior we sent DS1 to, 'the unbaptised' officially came at the bottom of the admissions priority, so I did explain that in our church we didn't splash water on babies, but he had had a service of naming and blessing, which they accepted as equivalent. They changed the wording of that policy within a year or two as well, to give families of unbaptised children attending church a higher priority than families not attending church at all ...

Yes, our church is like that too, in fact our son hadn't even had the blessing! We and our Pastor pointed out that in our church we did not baptise babies, we believed baptism was a commitment that only believers could make, and that sufficed - as you say a child from a committed non-christened family would have higher priority than one who was just christened and nothing else. Just being christened and going to cubs would put you quite low on the list, as there are always reams of committed churchgoers queueing up to get a place.

It also helped with our school if your church was affiliated to certain Christian Groups, like the Council if Churches, or the Evangelical Alliance. Ours was affiliated to EA, so that went in his favour too.

To the OP, I would say the same, check the criteria of the school you want, because they do vary. I believe Primary Schools are a lot less strict than Secondary (you don't say how old your child is).

(edited to add) : sorry, just read your post again, you'd hardly be taking him to a toddler group if he was ten!

rio

I too think that it does vary from parish to parish, and the problem can be that some churches suddenly see an influx of parents a few months before the application forms for the church school have to be completed, and then once the place is secure they mostly disappear again, so the church increases the required criteria to safeguard being used. I wanted my LO to go to our local Cof E school, but had problems because he had not been christened. Our denomination believes in adult not infant baptism and even though we had a letter from our minister stating this, and also stating that we had been regular worshippers for over 10 years, and that my husband is the assistant church treasurer, the school still got sniffy about it. In the end I decided that it wasn't worth the bother and opted for a village school 3 miles away, and I am so glad I did. A friend from church took the opposite view and sent her son there, but is constantly in bother because he does not attend the required once a month service at the CofE church, which you have to agree to when your child begins school. The reason he doesn't go, is because they take him to their own church every week - but the school don't find this acceptable!

Hawker

I think each school will have its 'admissions policy' decided by the governors, so will vary from place to place. You should be able to get a copy of this from the school.
If the school is also linked to LEA (controlled aided etc) you may find that the LEA also has a summary of this policy.