Agenda item

The 2018 - 2020 Lancashire SACRE Development Plan had been included in the agenda papers. The plan had been updated and would form the next steps of the 2021-2023 development plan.

It was suggested and agreed that members divide into groups and look at the objectives of the Lancashire SACRE Development Plan. The groups were asked to evaluate Objectives 1, 2 and 3 of the plan, then to evaluate and come up with the next steps for Objectives 4 and 5.

The Objectives were as follows:

·  Objective 1 - Raising standards by improving the quality of teaching, learning and assessment in Religious Education.

·  Objective 2 - Monitoring and evaluating standards and the quality of provision for RE in Lancashire schools.

·  Objective 3 – To improve the provision of Collective Worship.

·  Objective 4 – To ensure that the SACRE was effectively managed and worked in close cooperation with the local authority and other key stakeholders.

·  Objective 5 – To develop the contribution of RE to Community Cohesion.

Points raised from the groups for Objectives 4 and 5 were as follows:

Objective 4

·  It was felt that some SACRE meetings could still be held virtually. This would reduce unnecessary travel and be good management of time for members.

·  A timed agenda was suggested, with indications on the agenda of what decisions needed to be made, would help to manage time for members.

·  There should be an allocated social breakout time on the agenda for members to network with one another.

·  It was important to catch up with the contacts from the different faith representatives to check where they were up to.

·  In terms of the SACRE working positively in partnership with key local and national stakeholders there had to be a faith coordinator in place for this to work well.

·  The lack of Sikhism representation was noted.

·  One action point to be looked at and explored further was the agreed procedures for frequent non-attendance. The attendance process needed to be tightened up.

·  It was felt there needed to be an action plan to have contacts with the academies and have them promote the syllabus. Having  an academy representative on the SACRE was suggested. It was important to check what the progress was with SACRE and its partnership with academies as communication and engagement did not seem to be happening.

·  The 'Youth Voice' was another project to pick up on. One possibility was to look at having the young people attend virtually to ensure representation. Teachers could be invited along to SACRE meetings as part of the 'Youth Voice'.

·  Regarding how local schools could access events and training opportunities hosted by local teacher training organisations, the Covid pandemic had a large impact on this. There was a possibility here for looking at virtual training programmes going forward.

·  A survey was needed to see what groups were missing from the SACRE and what could be done to approach these groups.

·  In terms of teacher training, members enquired if this was a realistic objective for SACRE at this time.

Objective 5

·  It was noted that the SACRE did not make the most of the contacts from different faiths in Preston. It was important to turn the SACRE's attention to Preston using the interfaith projects.

·  In terms of devising an induction programme to ensure minimum requirements were met in line with SACRE/LCC policies, the enhancing of this work further had been interrupted because of Covid.

·  It was pointed out that 'Prevent' had not been on the agenda that often, although the question was raised about whether 'Prevent' fell outside SACRE's remit.

·  Regarding engagement with schools and the hosting of training events, there needed to be evidence that this had been done.

·  Also, in terms of the development of a sustainable primary/secondary school linking programme to promote community cohesion and tackle controversial issues, there needed to be evidence that this had been done.

Alison would draw up a new draft Lancashire SACRE Development Plan for the July 2021 meeting of SACRE to be finalised and agreed.