ABSTRACT
As a subject, religious education has a very curious position in primary schools. It is declared to be part of the primary school basic curriculum in the original 1988 Education Reform Act (ERA), notwithstanding that teachers, pupils and parents are protected by the Education Act 1944 from any compulsion to engage with the subject. Yet national policy has been insistent on its presence in schools. It is not, nor has it ever been, a national curriculum subject, but like a national curriculum subject it has national syllabus and guidance documents. It is the responsibility of local committees known as SACREs to agree upon and write the syllabus, and this syllabus applies in non-denominational schools. Such syllabuses must not be designed to convert pupils or to urge a particular religion or religious belief on pupils (Education Act 1944, Section 26 (2)). There is an expectation that you will know something of the content of the subject and how to teach it, and that is refl ected in the Standards, but teachers are still protected by the 1944 Act from any compulsion to teach it.
