While reading this thread, I saw a whole bunch of comments about the presumed effects of taking religion out of school that seemed to be more suppositions than anything.
However, a light bulb went on in my head: I'm living in a real-world experiment in secularism in schools: in response to a court challenge, the province of Ontario got rid of officially-sanctioned religion in schools in 1988. Before then, a lot of Christian religion was fair game. I remember reciting the Lord's Prayer every morning and explicitly Christian carols in our Christmas (not holiday) assemblies.
So far, this isn't unique. Plenty of places worldwide have secularized their public schools. What makes Ontario unique is that we have a control.
Along with our secular school boards, we also have a system of Catholic school boards that wasn't affected by the 1988 ruling: the religiosity of Catholic schools is also constitutionally-protected, so the Charter of Rights and Freedoms doesn't supersede the school's rights in this regard.
Other than religion, the schools are very similar: they both get government funding according to the same formula, they both have to meet the same provincial curriculum guidelines, they're located in the same communities - often right next to each other - and they both do the same standardized tests.
The major difference between them is religion: students in Catholic schools still have teacher-led prayer, character-building curriculum units use the life of Jesus as an example, and the students are taken to church regularly.
Now... there are a couple of other differences you should be aware of:
- Catholic boards aren't legally required to accept non-Catholic students, so there have been cases where they'll kick out - or refuse to admit - non-Catholic kids with behavioural issues or extreme special needs. OTOH, the public board has to accommodate every student who applies. This difference should give the Catholic board a slight edge in terms of academic performance.
- since the ruling, a fair number of parents who want their kids to have a free religious education - whether they're Catholic or not - have moved their kids to Catholic schools, so there may be a difference in the home life of the two groups of students (though if anything, this should magnify the effect of the schools' differences in terms of religion).
So... if you think religion in schools creates a difference in outcomes - or if you think it should create more of a difference - shout out the measure you had in mind and we'll see what the data say. We have 30 years of history, so there's plenty we can look at.
Now... there's one issue we can address right away: school shootings. Both systems have the same outcome: both systems had a school shooting in 1975 and AFAICT, neither have had one since then. Certainly nothing involving loss of life - I can't rule out whether either one had an incident that was too minor to make the news.
So... if you think that religion in education makes a difference - good or bad - tell us what difference you expect and we'll see if it's there.
However, a light bulb went on in my head: I'm living in a real-world experiment in secularism in schools: in response to a court challenge, the province of Ontario got rid of officially-sanctioned religion in schools in 1988. Before then, a lot of Christian religion was fair game. I remember reciting the Lord's Prayer every morning and explicitly Christian carols in our Christmas (not holiday) assemblies.
So far, this isn't unique. Plenty of places worldwide have secularized their public schools. What makes Ontario unique is that we have a control.
Along with our secular school boards, we also have a system of Catholic school boards that wasn't affected by the 1988 ruling: the religiosity of Catholic schools is also constitutionally-protected, so the Charter of Rights and Freedoms doesn't supersede the school's rights in this regard.
Other than religion, the schools are very similar: they both get government funding according to the same formula, they both have to meet the same provincial curriculum guidelines, they're located in the same communities - often right next to each other - and they both do the same standardized tests.
The major difference between them is religion: students in Catholic schools still have teacher-led prayer, character-building curriculum units use the life of Jesus as an example, and the students are taken to church regularly.
Now... there are a couple of other differences you should be aware of:
- Catholic boards aren't legally required to accept non-Catholic students, so there have been cases where they'll kick out - or refuse to admit - non-Catholic kids with behavioural issues or extreme special needs. OTOH, the public board has to accommodate every student who applies. This difference should give the Catholic board a slight edge in terms of academic performance.
- since the ruling, a fair number of parents who want their kids to have a free religious education - whether they're Catholic or not - have moved their kids to Catholic schools, so there may be a difference in the home life of the two groups of students (though if anything, this should magnify the effect of the schools' differences in terms of religion).
So... if you think religion in schools creates a difference in outcomes - or if you think it should create more of a difference - shout out the measure you had in mind and we'll see what the data say. We have 30 years of history, so there's plenty we can look at.
Now... there's one issue we can address right away: school shootings. Both systems have the same outcome: both systems had a school shooting in 1975 and AFAICT, neither have had one since then. Certainly nothing involving loss of life - I can't rule out whether either one had an incident that was too minor to make the news.
So... if you think that religion in education makes a difference - good or bad - tell us what difference you expect and we'll see if it's there.
