To welcome members to SACRE and receive a prayer

The acting chair (Louise Barker) welcomed the attendees to the hybrid meeting and checked that those attending remotely could hear and see the other attendees. The acting chair then led a prayer and reflection, giving time to think of those in the room and those not present. The group prayed for forgiveness for those who make errors and for the confidence to collaborate in the best interest of those they served.

Apologies were received from Lama Choesang, Jonathon Nicholas, Midge Ault and Anna Nugent.

To receive any details of Members nominated to attend the meeting in place of a Member of the Committee.

Mr Pete Hulme attended the meeting in place of Midge Ault. Louise Barker acted as chair in place of Lama Choesang 

To approve and sign the Minutes of the meeting held on 11^th March 2022.

Ruth Stanier pointed out that there was an error in the ‘Next Meeting Dates’ section, which should have read 10^th March 2023 instead of 10^th March 2022. The clerk acknowledged this and confirmed it would be corrected.

RESOLVED: That the minutes of the meeting on 11 March 2022 were agreed as a correct record and signed by the chairperson.

No pubic questions received.

To receive feedback from the 2022 RE conferences.

The acting chair invited Stephen Pett to present feedback on the conferences.

Stephen Pett (SP) Detailed that Herefordshire Primary School Conference took place online on 4^th July 2022 with over 22 teachers attending, which was a good number. The attendance was slightly lower than it had been in previous years, but over half of respondents felt the conference was ‘excellent’ and the other felt it was ‘good’. At the conference Mr Pett was joined by his new colleague Adam Robertson, who having been a primary school teacher for 14 years was able to draw on a wealth of personal experience and practice during his sessions.

Overall there were very positive comments and responses from teachers who attended. A lot of teachers were aiming to be very active and share resources they had received on the day when they got back to their schools. The vice chair noted that it all sounded very positive.

The acting chair then read out a statement from Lama Choesang regarding the Three Counties Secondary School Conference on 23^rd June 2022. Lama Choesang noted that Covid had adversely impacted the number of people present, but the conference was lively and benefitted greatly from input from Stephen Pett and Matt Blaylock, who were inspiring as lecturers and facilitators. In the morning there was a thought-provoking workshop on World Views and an in depth exploration of the Sikh faith. At lunch teachers were able to engage with Lama Choesang and ask questions about SACRE and the Buddhism. Overall it was felt that all attendees benefitted greatly from the workshops and were hopefully able to return with thought-provoking materials for their pupils and classes.

The acting chair noted that one of her colleagues had attended and came back very positive about the conference.

Cllr John Stone had attended the secondary conference for half a day and very much enjoyed it. He thought it was very well organised and benefitted from the excellent venue.

Stephen Pett gave an overview of feedback from the conferences. Attendance was impacted by Covid and securing release for teachers (only one teacher from Hereford attended), but there was very positive feedback from teachers who attended - who detailed what they intended to do with the information they had obtained from the workshops and sessions.

The committee asked Mr Pett if the location might have been a factor in only one teacher from Hereford attending, but Mr Pett suggested that this hadn’t been the case in the past. Puckrup Hotel was used because of its close proximity to each of the three counties. In the past there had been many more Herefordshire schools attending, but numbers had gone down over the last few years. SP didn’t think location was a barrier and brining it closer to Hereford might have an impact on Worcestershire and Gloucestershire attendance.

The committee also asked if holding the conferences slightly earlier in the year might help with attendance. SP explained they’d tried different times of the year, but schools  ...  view the full minutes text for item 28.

A briefing on OFSTED Inspections of RE.

Alison Naylor, talked through the Inspecting RE PowerPoint presentation included in the agenda:

PowerPoint Presentation (herefordshire.gov.uk)

This presentation provided a current summary of Ofsted and RE.

The committee asked if there were any stats about intercollective worship and Alison Naylor explained it wouldn’t be reported as a deep dive, but might show up in the personal development section of the report.

There were no further questions.

Reviewing Draft RE Surveys for Herefordshire primary and secondary schools.

Stephen Pett went through a draft RE survey based on a document from 2015. He advised keeping any new survey as similar as possible to allow for meaningful historical comparison and that amending the survey was preferable to starting from scratch.

The committee went through the survey:

Herefordshire Primary RE Survey 2022 draft questions.pdf

It was agreed that question 7 needed to be amended as detailed:

-        Understanding the aims of RE (keep)

-        Planing (keep)

-        Subject knowledge (keep)

-        Assessment (keep)

-        People progress (keep)

-        Pupil understanding of religions and beliefs to be combined with Teaching about non-religious world views.

-        Creative activities (remove)

-        Developing thinking  (keep)

-        Developing enquiry (keep)

-        Spiritual development (keep and include mindfulness)

Stephen Pett also suggested some new questions to add regarding the new syllabus:

-        Does it help pupils to build on prior/future learning?

-        Does it enable pupils to make connections with personal world views of people?

-        Is it helping you to provide a diverse education?

The committee agreed that question 16 was redundant and should be removed.

It was also agreed that the word ‘new’ should be removed from question 10.

The acting chair felt that the survey could be used to promote a teach/meet group and could also be helpful in gathering up an email contact database for those who need support. This would allow direct contact with RE coordinators rather than Headmasters and reception.

The committee agreed the survey should be carried out annually to ensure respondent details were up to date and accurate. It was also discussed and agreed that if possible the survey should be sent out in time for responses to be included in the next meeting. It was also agreed that if sufficient funds were available then NATRE membership should be offered as a prize for people completing the survey. 

APPROVED: Change the questions as detailed during the meeting and send out the surveys as soon as possible.

A verbal update and briefing on worldviews.

Stephen Pett provided a comprehensive background and overview of world views, explaining how academic papers from Amira Tharani and other others had contributed towards a shift towards the study of religion and world views and the need for an appropriate and practical set of guidelines and frameworks. Work on the project was ongoing and SP directed the committee towards the REC website for more information on this subject and that it would become increasingly significant by 2024:

Worldviews - The Religious Education Council of England and Wales

The acting chair note dthe importance of the work being done and suggested world view became a standing item for SACRE meetings.

APPROVED: World view activity to be a standing item in future SACRE meetings.

An update on NASACRE membership for 2022/23.

The Clerk explained that NASACRE membership had been deferred until 1^st September 2022, so that that the committee would get maximum value for money from its membership.

 SACRE Summer Term 2022 National SACRE updates from RE Today

Stephen Pett presented the agenda item document to the board:

SACRE national news updates July 2022.pdf (herefordshire.gov.uk)

The board welcomed the content and agreed it would be useful to share this information with local schools. It was suggested the database created from the RE survey could be used (once permission had been given) to send this out to RE coordinators at schools.

Cllr Harvey went back to the subject of Ofsted and raised concerns that RE was not being taken seriously as a subject and that other areas are lobbying their MPs to push for greater inclusion.

After a discussion on the subject, the board felt that the most effective first step to take would be to contact local MPs with a view to getting them to ask for RE to be included on the EBacc.

APPROVED The News update would be circulated to schools via the email database and SACRE would contact local MPS with a view to getting them to lobby for RE to be included on the EBacc.

·       18th November 2022

·       10th March 2023

· 18th November 2022

· 10th March 2023