[Greens-Media] Ethics classes here to stay as enrolment form is updated

[John Kaye]

Ethics classes here to stay as enrolment form is updated

Media release: 2 July 2014

This is the story that NSW Education Minister Adrian Piccoli doesn't want you to hear.

Late last month the NSW Department of Education and Communities made a quiet but significant change to the student enrolment form for public schools.

In 2012 the O'Farrell government caved in to demands from Fred Nile and introduced an enrolment process that treated ethics classes (SEE) as a second-class alternative to scripture (SRE) (See: "Opting out of religion only way in to ethics",<http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/opting-out-of-religion-only-way-in-to-ethics-20121204-2atad.html> SMH, 5 December 2012).

Parents were only to be advised about the existence of ethics classes at their child's school after they had indicated that they did not wish their child to attend scripture.

Now common sense has prevailed over the whims of Fred Nile and a single form has been introduced that allows parents to clearly identify whether they wish their child to attend SRE or SEE, or non-scripture where ethics are not available.

See new form here:
http://www.schools.nsw.edu.au/media/downloads/gotoschool/enrolment/detsef.pdf

Greens NSW MP John Kaye said: "For two years the public school enrolment process has been thrown into confusion just to appease Fred Nile and keep safe his vote in the Upper House.

"In order to protect the privileged position of scripture classes, the Christian Democrats manipulated the NSW Coalition into hiding the existence of the ethics alternative.

"Parents were denied front line information about the existence of a non-religious alternative and schools had to cope with an unwieldy two-stage process.

"At last Education Minister Adrian Piccoli has succeeded in getting his government to toss off the Christian Democrats and create an enrolment process that works.

"It might just be a change to a standard form but it has real implications for both parents and schools.

"The fiction that the Education Act treated ethics as a second class alternative has at last been put to bed.

"Fred Nile and his vocal supporters in the minority churches have finally lost the battle against ethics classes. The secular alternative to scripture is clearly here to stay and will no longer be hidden behind a messy two-stage process.

"In 2012 the Greens warned that the process would be unwieldy and unfairly discriminate against ethics classes.

"It is a shame that the O'Farrell government did not listen to the case for a fairer enrolment process.

"If they had read the Act and thought the process through, they would have seen that the two stage process would be confusing for schools and parents and lead to students misallocated to religion classes.

"It might have been Fred Nile's objective to create confusion that would see non-religious children end up in scripture classes but parental anger has clearly won the day," Dr Kaye said.

For more information: John Kaye 0407 195 455





John Kaye
Greens NSW MP

P: (02) 9230 2668 | F: facebook.com/john.kaye.mlc<http://www.facebook.com/john.kaye.mlc> | T: @johnkgreens<twitter.com/johnkgreens> | W: www.johnkaye.org.au<http://www.johnkaye.org.au>
Mail: Parliament House, Macquarie Street, Sydney, NSW 2000

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