Faith based schools (Islamic, Christian, Jewish etc.) good idea or not?

Answer 1

great idea. it helps you grow deeper in you faith day to day.

Answer 2

Depends what's taught.

Some religions have religious schools that focus on explaining the religion to those interested. I think that there's nothing wrong with that. May be a little bit of control over the curriculum to make sure some barriers are not crossed would make things more helpful.

However, a 'normal' curriculum in faith-based schools is, in general, not a good thing.

1 We need to get to know each others backgrounds and cultures, going to school together is a great way to do it.

2 Will admission to the schools be restricted by religion necessarily? There are some countries where religion-based schools actually act like 'normal' schools. However the criteria for admission, and the pressure on the difference in religion is not healthy.

That said, a religion-based school is better than no school at all. Some parts of the world have very few schools and religious organisations do offer schooling, even subsidised schooling. It is hard to believe that people attending these schools would not be influenced to join the religion, but as long as efforts are made to accommodate other religions, such as having local guest speakers from other religions, things can be acceptable.

Answer 3

Interesting question, since (until very recently), the majority of primary schools were faith-based. So the non-faith-based public schools come along, having only existed for a couple of hundreds of years, as opposed to the faith-based schools, which have existed for around a couple of thousands of years, and say that it is the faith-based schools which are irrelevant.

In the city and State in which I live, faith-based schools turn out students with consistently higher reading and math scores than all but two of the public school districts. The faith-based high schools have a higher percentage of graduating students, and of those, more percentage-wise go on to college.

As for the two public schools with a good educational product, what they have in common with the faith-based schools is that they have concerned parents who gladly pay higher taxes in order to have high-quality teachers who expect results.

The thing that faith-based schools do, that others almost never can, is expel students from the system for bad conduct. The biggest public high school system where I live can only shuttle conduct problems to other schools in the system. If a school can expel a student, the school can encourage high quality education.

So let me get to the point of your question. I seem to sense an assumption that teching a faith is bad. It isn't. The question also contains an implied assumption that teaching a faith is the equivalent of indoctrination. It isn't. I am still in touch with maybe 20% of my grade school class, 40 years after graduation, and those who even thought that they were being indoctrinated simply rejected their religion as soon as they had a chance.

So there you have it. Ability to run classes well, because they can get rid of conduct problems. Higher quality education, because the parents have to pay the real cost of education. Higher graduation rates. At least some moral education, which everyone needs. And if they try to indoctrinate, they lose the commitment of the student.

I don't see a down side.

Answer 4

bad idea I can't see why its necessary, everyone knows what they are and usually parents bring children up within tthose beliefs but as they grow and in line with educating students they should cover the full spectrum of beliefs so that they can understand them, make fact based opinions based on studies, not adult opinons

Answer 5

It depends on if that's the kind of education you want your child to have. I taught in private, catholic schools for 5 years. There are benefits and drawbacks. They are private and you pay to go to them, so they can establish the curriculum whatever they see fit, and they decide on who attends their school. Public must take everyone.

Answer 6

No, not a good idea. Keep religion out of education (and everything else for that matter).

Answer 7

Bad. It's expensive, and leaves the student ignorant to their peers' opinions.

Answer 8

bad bad bad mainly islamic ones

if muslims want to go to an islamic school then they can go to one of their own fundamentalist countries in the middle east or africa

jews - mmm israel should do

christians - possibly africa somewhere or possibly the deep south US

f'n re.tarded concept

Answer 9

bad

Answer 10

no, not good!
Its the same principal, we must have seperation of gove't and church.