Standing Advisory Council on Religious Education
Monday 8 June 2015 6.00 pm
ROYAL BOROUGH OF WINDSOR AND MAIDENHEAD
STANDING ADVISORY COUNCIL ON RELIGIOUS EDUCATION (SACRE)
8 June 2015
PRESENT: Mike Gammage (Chairman), Karen Butler (Vice-Chairman), Councillor Natasha Airey, Barbara Meaney, Hilary Harris, Anthea West, Rev Joan Hicks,
Officers in attendance: Anne Andrews, David Cook, and Simon Evry.
 | | ACTION | ||
| 1 | Welcome | | ||
| The Chairman welcomed the SACRE Members to the meeting. | | ||
| 2 | Apologies for Absence & Declarations of Interest | | ||
| Apologies for absence were received from Cllr Kellaway, Usman Bhally, Felicity Gunn, Louise Ceska, Deborah Firth and Gary Homewood. | | ||
| 3 | Minutes | | ||
| Members approved the minutes of the previous meeting on 5 March 2015. It was noted that the changes to the curriculum, that required an additional 2 hours teaching for maths and English, may have a detrimental effect on RE. The response to Lord Nash’s letter to be circulated to SACRE. It was agreed to add a standing item on community cohesion and invite an RBWM officer to talk to the item. | Anne Andrews Shilpa Manek | ||
| 4 | Membership Update | | ||
| The SACRE noted the current membership of the SACRE and agreed that Usman Bhally become a member:
| | ||
| 5 | Self Evaluation Framework Section 5 – Promoting Community Cohesion | | ||
| As raised under minutes and RBWM officer to be invited to talk about community cohesion.
| Shilpa Manek | ||
| 6 | NASACRE AGM | | ||
| Barbara Meaney informed SACRE that she attended the NASACRE AGM on 21st May 2015 in Birmingham. The key speaker was Charles Clarke who questioned if the current statutory framework was the right one to promote RE in schools. He put forward some questions that he felt should be asked such as if RE should be a statutory requirement, what should it be called Instruction or Education, should the RE curriculum be set nationally or locally and how should SACRE’s work. He also suggested that SACRE membership should reflect modern society and not that of 1944. In the afternoon session there were a couple of seminar sessions and the PowerPoints were available on the NASACRE website. It was noted that there was a new NASACRE website and that the SACRE survey would be open soon. | | ||
| 7 | SACRE Dashboard | | ||
| It was noted that there had recently been four Ofsted inspection reports and not one of them made any mention of religious education. The typical comment you get would be along the lines that spiritual needs are catered for.
| Anne Andrews Simon Every & Liz Jenkins | ||
| 8 | RE Teacher Training and Support | | ||
| The SACRE noted that the next joint SACRE meeting would be considering how to get more out of visits to places of worship, the last two visits were to a Synagogue and mosque. It was noted that feedback forms were circulated after visits and it was recommended that feedback be sought as why people are not attending meetings and to see if the dates of visits are the problem.
Anne would be visiting Trevelyan Middle School's as they have issues with RE and she has been invited to Holyport College as they have the Oxford Foundation attending. Karen Butler raised concern that Simon Evry was leaving his job and that there was a decline in Cllr attendance at the meeting. Cllr Airey reported that in June Cabinet would be appointing Councillors to SACRE and that she would speak to Simon Evry about transition. (Cllr Airey left the meeting) It was recommended and agreed that members of SACRE could be used as a teaching aid or as a conduit to organisations. It was also noted that Shilpa Manek was investigating having a SACRE webpage for teachers to access information with links to RE sites such as RE Online.
| Anne Andrews Anne Andrews | ||
| 9 | SACRE Self-Evaluation Framework – section 2: Effectiveness of the Locally Agreed Syllabus. | | ||
| This item was deferred to the next meeting and it was agreed to email the Locally Agreed Syllabus. Management of SACRE to be taken as a discussion topic at the 2nd meeting and Collective Community Cohesion at the 3rd meeting. SACRE agreed to hold 4 meetings per year in October 2015, January 2016, March 2016 and the first week of July 2016. | Shilpa Manek | ||
| 10 | Any Other Business | | ||
| Hilary Harris agreed to attend Mondays conference. SACRE Budget – spending priorities to be discussed at the next meeting. SACRE thanked Simon Evry for his support. | Simon Evry | ||
| 11 | Dates of Future Meetings | | ||
| The SACRE noted that the dates of future meetings were to be confirmed. The meeting which began at 6pm ended at 7.45pm. | |