Agenda item

The Education Act 1996 requires Local Authorities to review its locally AS every five years. Staffordshire’s syllabus was due to be reviewed in 2021 but due to the fallout from COVID-19 this was delayed. An Agreed Syllabus (AS) Conference had to be established in order to agree the revised AS. This would then be formally approved by the County Council.

The SACRE meeting was adjourned in order for the Agreed Syllabus Conference to be convened.

The Agreed Syllabus Conference (ASC) was convened. Attendance and apologies were as for the meeting of SACRE.

a.    The minutes of the last meeting held on 29 June 2022 were agreed.

b.    Further to the report, Mary Gale updated the ASC on the work undertaken since the last meeting and presented a final draft of the AS for discussion and approval.

The ASC was provided with the final draft of the AS for approval. By way of an update the SACRE were informed that:

·         a vision had now been included to complement the aims of the overall AS.

·         more detail had been included explaining that the AS sought to achieve this vision through following three specific themes - Exploring, Engaging, and Reflecting, supported by six dimensions.

·         additional references had been made to nonreligious beliefs and world views.

·         a number of appendices had been added to the document as examples of lesson planning to support delivery of the AS, as it was noted that this was often requested by schools.

A debate ensued about the way in which “world views” was presented. It was suggested that this could be one word, two words, two words hyphenated, one word capital W, or two words capital W and V. The NATRE website and teaching documents presented this as one word (without a capital W). It was initially suggested that, to keep consistency, this should be the way it was presented in the Agreed Syllabus. However, it was argued that it was grammatically correct to display it as two separate words as it was essentially the way in which a person “viewed the world”. It was agreed to consistently display the term “world view” as two words throughout the Agreed Syllabus, with additional detail added to the footnote on page 5 of the document to state that the “Staffordshire SACRE had chosen the editorial principle of presenting “world view” as two words but acknowledged that it was often referred to as one word”.

Additionally, some amendments were requested to be made to names included in the acknowledgments section of the document. Prior to publication, the format of the graphics and text would also be checked.

The Chair then invited each group of the ASC to vote as to whether they were happy to adopt the text as the Agreed Syllabus for 2023 to 2028 to present to the SACRE for adoption. Each group was asked in turn to vote with the following result:

Group A – unanimously voted in favour of the text going forward.

Group B – unanimously voted in favour of the text going forward.

Group C – unanimously voted in favour of the text going forward.

Group D – unanimously voted in favour of the text going forward.

Following this the next steps of the approval process were outlined to the SACRE, and it was agreed that a further update of the approval process would be given at the SACRE meeting due to take place in February 2023.

Following approval, it was explained that a launch programme would be organised to take place in early 2023 where schools would be invited to attend a presentation of the new AS. A transition period would take place in the spring and summer terms of the 2022/23 academic year, with full implementation taking place from the start of the new academic year 2023 onwards.

Resolved: That:

a. the Agreed Syllabus conference agreed to adopt the text and present it to the SACRE as the Agreed Syllabus for 2023 to 2028.

b. an update of the approval process of the Agreed Syllabus be brought to the SACRE meeting due to take place in February 2023.

The Agreed Syllabus Conference meeting was adjourned in order for the SACRE to be reconvened.