Provides an accessible overview of the debates, issues and practicalities of faith-based education. It sets out the challenges and opportunities of different approaches to faith schools and addresses the choices faced by parents.

Should a liberal democratic state permit religious schools? Should it fund them? What principles should govern these decisions in a society marked by religious and cultural pluralism? In Faith in Schools?, Ian MacMullen tackles these important questions through both political and educational theory, and he reaches some surprising and provocative conclusions. MacMullen argues that parents' desires to educate their children "in the faith" must not be allowed to deny children the opportunity for ongoing rational reflection about their values. Government should safeguard children's interests in developing as autonomous persons as well as society's interest in the education of an emerging generation of citizens. But, he writes, liberal theory does not support a strict separation of church and state in education policy. MacMullen proposes criteria to distinguish religious schools that satisfy legitimate public interests from those that do not. And he argues forcefully that governments should fund every type of school that they permit, rather than favoring upper-income parents by allowing them to buy their way out of the requirements deemed suitable for children educated at public expense. Drawing on psychological research, he proposes public funding of a broad range of religious primary schools, because they can help lay the foundations for young children's future autonomy. In secondary education, by contrast, even private religious schools ought to be obliged to provide robust exposure to the ideas of other religions, to atheism, and to nonreligious approaches to ethics.

Exploring a subject that is as important as it is divisive, this two-volume work offers the first current, definitive work on the intricacies and issues relative to America's faith-based schools. The Praeger Handbook of Faith-Based Schools in the United States, K–12 is an indispensable study at a time when American education is increasingly considered through the lenses of race, ethnicity, gender, and social class. With contributions from an impressive array of experts, the two-volume work provides a historical overview of faith-based schooling in the United States, as well as a comprehensive treatment of each current faith-based school tradition in the nation. The first volume examines three types of faith-based schools—Protestant schools, Jewish schools, and Evangelical Protestant homeschooling. The second volume focuses on Catholic, Muslim, and Orthodox schools, and addresses critical issues common to faith-based schools, among them state and federal regulation and school choice, as well as ethnic, cultural, confessional, and practical factors. Perhaps most importantly for those concerned with the questions and controversies that abound in U.S. education, the handbook grapples with outcomes of faith-based schooling and with the choices parents face as they consider educational options for their children.

Inspiring Faith in Schools addresses the privileging of secularism that appears to affect RE in countries influenced by modern western thought. The authors argue that a more engaging form of RE would emerge if religious life were to inhabit centre stage. Currently religious faith is made to hover in the wings awaiting the call to face the inquisitorial challenge of the modern day enquirer. The consequent relationship between pupil and the Divine as the purpose of study is then already intrinsically irreligious, as indicated in the Book of Job by putting God in the dock, whereas it is the pupil who should be (cross-)examining his or her life. What are the ways of exciting and engaging the young so that they begin to entertain the possibility of religious life as a genuine option for themselves? Leading scholars in philosophy and theology from the UK, Australia, Canada and the USA come together to address these questions together with RE experts. Marius Felderhof writes an Afterword summing up the challenges faced by such a re-visioning of RE.

- Do faith schools have a place in a plural society? - Which types of school contribute most effectively to a plural society? This fascinating monograph seeks to answer these questions and more by exploring the fit between personal, spiritual and academic goals in contemporary educational experience and individual school cultures. Jo Cairns, a well-respected authority on faith schools, argues that educational ideology in plural societies has to find a way of recognizing and responding to the 'predicament' of pluralism as it is experienced by individuals and communities. This provocative and challenging book will undoubtedly stimulate debate among educationists across the world.

This book examines the effects of faith schools on social cohesion and inter-ethnic relations. Faith schools constitute approximately one third of all state-maintained schools and two fifths of the independent schools in England. Nevertheless, they have historically been, and remain, controversial. In the current social climate, questions have been raised about the ability of faith schools to promote Community Cohesion and, included within that, their ability to promote tolerance. This book explores one aspect of the debate by examining the effect that faith schools have on their students’ attitudes of tolerance. As well as asking what differences exist between students in faith and non-faith schools, it also looks at which aspects of the schools might be affecting the students and their attitudes towards different minorities. The book is a must-read for students and researchers in the fields of education and religious studies, as well as anyone with an interest in the place of faith schools in a modern multicultural society.

The Future of Publicly Funded Faith Schools addresses and critically examines the arguments both for and against the continued maintenance of faith-based schools within a publicly funded state system. Addressing the issue systemically, first grounding the discussion in the practical world of education before raising the central philosophical issues stemming from faith-based education, it provides a balanced synthesis of the different arguments surrounding faith schools. The book expounds upon the different threats facing faith-based schools, including their perceived potential to undermine social cohesion within a multi-cultural society, and the questioning of their right to receive public funding, and examines what these mean for their future. Examining these threats, it questions: What it means for a school to be ‘faith-based’. The nature of religious education both within and without a faith-based school environment. The ethical, epistemological, and political issues arising from faith-based education. The concepts of the common good and social cohesion. Whether there is possible reconciliation between opposing parties. The Future of Publicly Funded Faith Schools makes a unique contribution to the literature in this area and is crucial reading for anyone interested in what the future holds for publicly funded faith schools including academics, researchers, and postgraduate students in the fields of education, religious studies, policy, and politics of education, sociology, and philosophy.

This is the account of a qualitative research project investigating the experiences of teachers in English church schools implementing the new pedagogical approach What If Learning. The findings of the project are significant for all those involved in church school education and point towards new ways of thinking about Christian faith and learning.

It isn’t just in recent arguments over the teaching of intelligent design or reciting the pledge of allegiance that religion and education have butted heads: since their beginnings nearly two centuries ago, public schools have been embroiled in heated controversies over religion’s place in the education system of a pluralistic nation. In this book, Benjamin Justice and Colin Macleod take up this rich and significant history of conflict with renewed clarity and astonishing breadth. Moving from the American Revolution to the present—from the common schools of the nineteenth century to the charter schools of the twenty-first—they offer one of the most comprehensive assessments of religion and education in America that has ever been published. From Bible readings and school prayer to teaching evolution and cultivating religious tolerance, Justice and Macleod consider the key issues and colorful characters that have shaped the way American schools have attempted to negotiate religious pluralism in a politically legitimate fashion. While schools and educational policies have not always advanced tolerance and understanding, Justice and Macleod point to the many efforts Americans have made to find a place for religion in public schools that both acknowledges the importance of faith to so many citizens and respects democratic ideals that insist upon a reasonable separation of church and state. Finally, they apply the lessons of history and political philosophy to an analysis of three critical areas of religious controversy in public education today: student-led religious observances in extracurricular activities, the tensions between freedom of expression and the need for inclusive environments, and the shift from democratic control of schools to loosely regulated charter and voucher programs. Altogether Justice and Macleod show how the interpretation of educational history through the lens of contemporary democratic theory offers both a richer understanding of past disputes and new ways of addressing contemporary challenges.