Hampshire County Council Standing Advisory Council for Religious Education Meeting

Apologies were received from Rhiannon Love, Alasdair Richardson, Sheikh Fazle Abbas Datoo, Noel Thorpe-Tracey, Graeme Rowe, Sushma Sahajpal, and Rhian Jones.

Members were mindful that where they believed they had a Disclosable Pecuniary Interest in any matter considered at the meeting they must declare that interest at the time of the relevant debate and, having regard to the circumstances described in Part 3 Paragraph 1.5 of the County Council's Members' Code of Conduct, leave the meeting while the matter was discussed, save for exercising any right to speak in accordance with Paragraph 1.6 of the Code. Furthermore Members were mindful that where they believed they had a Personal interest in a matter being considered at the meeting they considered whether such interest should be declared, and having regard to Part 5, Paragraph 4 of the Code, considered whether it was appropriate to leave the meeting whilst the matter was discussed, save for exercising any right to speak in accordance with the Code.

Justine Ball declared that she works one day a month for NATRE as an RE ambassador for the South East.

Elizabeth Jenkerson noted that she was a judge for the Westhill Awards which gives grants to SACREs.

Councillor Christopher Donnelly declared that he was a governor for a Church of England primary school.

The minutes of the previous meeting on 3 March 2021 were agreed.

Item 143 - It was noted that the Interfaith Calendar had not been produced for 2022 and going forward the format would be reviewed as paper calendars are not as popular.

Item 145, recommendation 2 – The withdrawal survey had been put back to the autumn term 2021 and had now been issued to schools.

Item 145, recommendation 3 – there are ongoing discussions about RE at key stage 4 and there have been some positive responses regarding GCSE entries.

There were no deputations.

The Chairman welcomed everyone to the first ‘live’ meeting as the previous one in June had been a virtual informal briefing. She gave a special mention to Father John Chandler who had been newly appointed as the Roman Catholic representative and to Heather Thorpe-Tracey who was standing in for her husband.

Welcome was also extended to all other new members, for whom this was their first face to face meeting.

Members were informed that applications for the 2022-2023 Farmington Scholarships for teachers were open and further information was available from Patricia Hannam.

SACRE received a report from Patricia Hannam, the County Inspector/Advisor informing members of changes to membership (item 6 in the Minute Book).

Members were notified of membership changes to groups A and D.  It was requested that a full list of members should be provided in the next meeting’s membership report.

RESOLVED:

·         That SACRE noted the changes to membership and that there are still vacancies for members of Group A from the United Reformed Church and the Church of Latter-Day Saints.

SACRE considered a report from Patricia Hannam, County Inspector/Adviser, on the discussions of the Monitoring Group at its meeting on 22 September 2021 (item 7 in the Minute Book). The Chairman of the Monitoring Group, Chris Hughes, began by outlining the report with Patricia Hannam giving further details.

In discussing the current situation of the GCSE, members were informed by the teachers on SACRE that the intention was for GCSE examinations in 2022 to go ahead with teachers being given advance warning of the topics to focus on in revision.

Members were informed that two Hampshire secondary RE Heads of Department had been accepted onto the national RE leadership training pathway and it was agreed that they should be invited to speak at a SACRE meeting about their experiences on the programme.

It was noted that Ofsted reports are now less informative and are written more for parents.

Concerns were raised about the impact of the withdrawal of the bursary for trainee RE teachers on recruitment. The 1 year NQT programme had been replaced by the 2 year Early Career Teacher (ECT) programme as there had been concerns about numbers of teachers leaving the profession early, but the programme was having problems, particularly with its IT.  Hampshire had stepped up to provide support to Hampshire teachers with Patricia Hannam supporting secondary teachers.  SACRE was informed by Jeff Williams that, currently, Winchester University is committed to keeping RE on its teacher training programme.  It was felt that the Monitoring Group should monitor recruitment and retention and the effectiveness of the ECT programme. These concerns would also be brought to the South Central Hub for discussion, Justine Ball would mention it at AREIAC and Patricia Hannam at AULRE.

Members were reminded that monitoring Collective Worship was one of SACRE’s duties and it was to become a regular item on the Monitoring Group’s agenda and part of monitoring visits.  A SACRE member asked for the legal basis of this remit to be published at the next SACRE meeting.

RESOLVED:

·         That SACRE noted the report

·         That SACRE agreed to invite the two Heads of RE on the National Leadership programme to speak at the next SACRE meeting.

·         That SACRE asked that the Monitoring Group should monitor the recruitment and retention of teachers and the Early Career Teacher Programme and the impact of these on Hampshire schools due to its concern about recruitment and retention.

SACRE members considered the SACRE Annual Report 2020/2021 presented by Patricia Hannam (Item 8 in the Minute Book).

Members were reminded that SACRE had a duty to produce an annual report on its activities.  They were told that, as a result of lobbying by NASACRE, the government was going to start looking at the annual reports that SACREs submit.

Patricia Hannam worked through the report pointing out a number of elements.  She thanked Sue Butler, the clerk to SACRE, for her behind scenes work as the local authority support.  It was noted that there had been an advantage to running training courses virtually during the year in that attendance had been much higher as teachers did not have to travel and that this would continue.  Members’ attention was also drawn to the RE Curriculum Centre which was one of the last few remaining and that it was funded by subscriptions; Lydia Revett was thanked for her work at the centre and members were invited to visit it in its new location.

RESOLVED:

·         That SACRE approved its Annual Report for 2020/2021 and would forward it to the relevant internal and external bodies.

SACRE Members considered the revised Three-Year Action Plan brought for ratification from the informal briefing on 28 June 2021(item 9 in the Minute Book).

It was brought to Members’ attention that a review of SACRE’s constitution had been included in the Action Plan (1.6) as it had last been revised in 2009. An additional recommendation was added with regard to the revision of the current constitution by a small working group after the professional advisers had consulted with the Hampshire Legal Team.

Members convened in their groups to vote on the revised Three-Year Action Plan which was unanimously approved.

RESOLVED:

·         That SACRE approved the Three-Year Action Plan 2021 -2024

·         That SACRE agreed that the professional advisers should consult with the Hampshire Legal Team regarding a revision of its constitution and, if advised, convene a working group with members from all four groups to review the current constitution and bring an interim recommendation to the SACRE meeting in June 2022.

SACRE considered a report from Justine Ball, the Primary Inspector/Advisor, on developments nationally regarding religious education (item 10 in the Minute Book).

Members were given a brief overview of the report with an opportunity to ask questions and make comments.  It was highlighted that the advisers had both attended a recent virtual training session run by NASACRE on their new annual report template. It was also noted that NASACRE was offering a variety of virtual training sessions throughout the year which members could attend.

  RESOLVED:

·         That SACRE noted the report

The Council received a verbal report from Justine Ball, the Primary Inspector/Adviser on the activities of the South Central SACRE Hub (Item 11 in the Minute Book).

At their meeting in September 2021 they had discussed their procedures and approaches for reviewing agreed syllabuses, collective worship and ways to incorporate diversity in teaching.

The next meeting, to which all SACRE members were invited, would be held on Teams on 10 January 2022.  Topics for discussion would include the Early Career Teacher Programme and Ofsted visits.

Members thanked Councillor Still for chairing her first ‘real’ SACRE meetings.

Patricia Hannam invited all SACRE members to attend the virtual launch of Living Difference IV which was taking place on 30 November 2021.  The whole-day event had 180 teachers booked to attend; speakers would include Paul Smalley from NASACRE, Professor Gert Biesta, Professor of Educational Theory and Pedagogy at Edinburgh University, and Ed Pawson, Chair of the REC and there would also be workshops. A second launch conference on 2 January 2022 had been arranged due to the popularity of the first and already had 50 delegates.

Danny Habel, SACRE’s Jewish representative, offered to speak in any school about the celebration of Hannukah which was coming up shortly.  Members should contact Sue Butler in the first instance who would pass on his details to them.  Patricia Hannam reminded members that the RE Centre holds a list of potential speakers for many faiths.

The date of the next meeting was confirmed as 1 March 2022 at 2.00pm in the Ashburton Hall, Hampshire County Council, Winchester.