What consideration is the Welsh Government giving to the role of religious education in helping to tackle extremism and how is this helping to shape the development of the new religious education curriculum emerging from the Successful Futures report?
Religious Education (RE) has and is continuing to have an important role in helping to tackle extremism in schools.
RE aims to help learners to explore fundamental questions relating to human experience, relationships and responsibilities, whilst also helping them to learn about beliefs based on both secular and religious values. It is not intended for RE to promote a particular faith or belief.
The National Exemplar Framework for RE for 3 to 19-year-olds in Wales was published to support local authorities (through their Standing Advisory Councils on Religious Education) to design agreed syllabuses that ensure consistency across Wales and seek to raise standards.
As you are aware the Counter-Terrorism and Security Act 2015 includes a new duty on schools and colleges to “have due regard, in the exercise of their functions, to prevent people from being drawn into terrorism”, the UK Government published the Prevent Duty Guidance: for England and Wales for specified public bodies, including education providers.
The Welsh Government subsequently updated the guidance document 'Respect and resilience' in January 2016.
This guidance supports the development of community cohesion and prevents extremism in schools and other educational settings in Wales, ensuring they are able to meet the legal requirements of the Counter-Terrorism and Security Act 2015. The guidance is non-age specific, covering the Foundation Phase, primary and secondary stages and provides clear, practical advice.
The reformed Welsh Baccalaureate introduced for first teaching in September 2015 also includes an option through the Global Citizenship Challenge to allow schools in Wales to address the issue of extremism through an accredited Challenge brief. Due to the sensitive nature of the topic a resource pack to accompany this challenge has been produced by the Getting on Together (GOT) Challenging Extremism programme.
Looking ahead, the design of the new curriculum is being taken forward by a network of Pioneer Schools. They are working together as a single national network of schools to co-design, consult, inform, support and build capacity in schools across Wales, working with an all-Wales partnership with Welsh Government, Estyn, Higher Education, business and other key partners.
Professor Graham Donaldson made it clear in ‘Successful Futures’ that RE should form part of the Humanities Area of Learning and Experience, and should remain a statutory curriculum requirement.
Over the coming weeks, a working group of Pioneer Schools will be established to begin designing the Humanities Area of Learning and Experience. They will be engaging with stakeholders and experts during this period and there will be more formal opportunities for interested parties to comment on proposals in relation to the new curriculum, by way of surveys or consultation, at strategic points during development.
The four purposes outlined in ‘Successful Futures’ will be central to the design of the new curriculum to ensure all our children and young people will be ethical, informed citizens who understand and exercise their human and democratic rights and responsibilities. We envisage the new curriculum will be available to schools and settings in 2018 and used to support teaching and learning by 2021.