Moonfish

Please can someone tell me is an Independant secondary school a school that does not have a specific religion attached to it.
Am looking at a site with info about different schools, they only have Catholic, or Independant, so was wondering about all the other options, such as Anglican etc
Thanks for the help !!!

HelenTD

It might be easier to classify these schools as government or non-government. Govt schools are the state-run schools, non-govt are the privately run schools, that might be of the Catholic, Lutheran, Uniting Church, or even the occasional Anglican persuasion. Confusion can easily arise due to the WA Govt's Independent Public School programme, where individual state-run schools can apply for independent status, which apparently will achieve all sorts of wondrous things - some info on it here. You also have to remember that in Australia, public schools are state-run schools, not the UK understanding of public schools like Harrow and Eton.

You might find it easier to look at these schools via the My School website http://www.myschool.edu.au/SchoolSearch.aspx, searching by suburb or individual school name, if you know it. Make sure that you tick the boxes to search for both govt and non-govt schools. When you hit search, it gives you a list of schools and states whether it's govt or non-govt. Click on the one you want and once you've opened up a school profile, if you look down the left hand side, you will see a link for "Local Schools". If you click on there, it will give you a list of all the other schools nearby, including the distances from the original school you selected.

State schools usually are called XXXX Primary School (often the suburb name, sometimes a street/landmark), XXXX High School or Senior High School or XXXX District High School, some state high schools are XXXX Senior College or XXXX Community High School. If there's a saint or religion in the title, it's almost certainly a non-govt school.

What_a_life

Thank you so much for all that info Helen. I must admit that I find it hard sometimes to distinguish between what is private/public. If in doubt I look to see if I can find anything that mentions fees anywhere. Will check out the website you recommended
Thanks once again.

fish.01

Some Catholic schools are labelled separately from Independent as they have a Catholic umbrella group that runs a whole lot of the Catholic schools. These are called systemic Catholic schools. The other Catholic schools are independent and all other schools are independent as well whether nominally Anglican or whatever. As Helen said easier to think of all of these as non govt schools.

DadAgain

If you're looking for a school without religion - you may be sorely disappointed.

Here in Brisbane for example, all state schools have christianisty imposed on their students by unqualified preachers UNLESS you specifically opt out and force your child to be the odd freak who has to go and sit in the library.

The private schooling sector is almost entirely wrapped up by various religious denominations.

As far as I can tell there is only one option in the whole of greater Brisbane for a secular education:
- Brisbane Grammar School (or Girls Grammar) @ $18k a year.
..although I guess you could go homeschool or "School of Distance Education" via the internet!


Its so good to live in a place where you have such a variety of choices in education... you can chose whatever brand/flavour of christianity you like for your kids .

HelenTD

They'll probably be alright in WA, though. At our state primary, you have the choice of Christian, Baha'i, or nothing. You have to pay extra on the school fees for the RE sessions and it is up to each family to choose. There are quite a few kids who take the 'nothing' option, mainly because they have a religion other than Christian or Baha'i, though there's probably a few non-believers in the opt-out group. The kids seem to enjoy their RE sessions, and about twice a year parents are invited to the school by the external RE teachers to see the kids perform (speaking or singing) and show us what they have learnt.

As we are not churchgoers, we have never heard/seen our kids sing a hymn or Christmas carol, there is no nativity play. There are no Christmas decorations. I find that a bit sad.

What_a_life

As we are not churchgoers, we have never heard/seen our kids sing a hymn or Christmas carol, there is no nativity play. There are no Christmas decorations. I find that a bit sad.[/QUOTE]



Yes, I agree. I like to go and watch the kids do their nativity play each year, or at least sing some chrissy songs.

Just learnt from my eldest (10 yr) that he actually goes to Catholic scripture class ... He started in the Oct (back in 2007) ,in kindy, so all the other kids were already well established
The scripture teacher asked him what scripture group he should be in. He told them Catholic . He doesnt know anything about religion really,as we are in no way religious, so I asked him why he had chosen the Catholic group, he said it was cos his best friend was in the Catholic group.
All this time ,and I never knew
Hubby said we could look to enrol the kids into a catholic school that we have seen and both like, say he chose for himself to join the C scripture group. Yeah right,, just wait til they found out it was only cos his besty was in it.

HelenTD

Our youngest has tried all the options at his primary school. He started off with Baha'i, then I found out that he opted out and joined the heathen kids in the library or wherever they put them. I asked him why he'd quit Baha'i and he said that he found it hard to accept and follow some of their values (peace, harmony, unity were too challenging for him to deal with). No criticism of Baha'i and the teachers there, who were all lovely, but this boy is something else. After a while, he got fed up in the library, and joined his friend in the Christian group and seems to enjoy it. I never was told by the school that he'd moved from one activity to another - why on earth would I need to know?