Religion and Worldviews: Professor Sir Malcolm Evans on high-profile commission for national plan for RE

Press release issued: 17 September 2018

Last week the Commission on Religious Education, of which the Law School’s Professor Sir Malcolm Evans is a member, published a report setting out recommendations for a new and inclusive vision of the subject of Religious Education (RE) in schools, with a curriculum that reflects the diversity of religious and non-religious worldviews.

The Commission on Religious Education (CoRE) is an independent committee established in 2016 to review legal, education and policy frameworks for RE in all schools and colleges in England that educate pupils of any age up to 19.

The report (‘Religion and Worldviews: the way forward. A national plan for RE’) is built around a new National Entitlement setting out what pupils in all publicly funded schools should be entitled to be taught, and ultimately aims “to improve the quality and rigour of religious education and its capacity to prepare pupils for life in modern Britain.”

To reflect the need for a broader, more inclusive curriculum that incorporates religious and non-religious traditions and values, the report proposes that the subject be called Religion and Worldviews.

The plan provides flexibility in terms of schools’ approach to implementing the National Entitlement into programmes of study.

Commenting on the report, Sir Malcolm said:

"Educating young people concerning religions and worldviews must be a major element of preparation for life in modern British Society. This Report provides an imaginative, innovative yet entirely realistic model for how this can be achieved, and we both hope and anticipate that this will shape the teaching of the subject for years to come."

Chair of the Commission on RE, The Very Rev Dr John Hall, former Chief Education Officer for the Church of England, said:

"Young people today are growing up in a wonderfully diverse society. Day by day they can encounter different cultures and worldviews, if not personally at least through the media. So it has never been more important for people to understand the main traditions of faith and belief and the wide variety of worldviews. In employment and in everyday life, young people need to achieve fluency in relating to people with different traditions and outlooks from their own.

At present, the quality of Religious Education in too many schools is inadequate in enabling pupils to engage deeply with the worldviews they will encounter. Many structural changes in education in the past twenty years have unintentionally undermined the integrity of RE in the school curriculum. The Commission is proposing a fresh start for the subject with a vision for the teaching of Religion and Worldviews in every school.”

The report was officially launched at a meeting in Parliament on 12 September.

Further information

Sir Malcolm Evans is Professor of Public International Law at the University of Bristol. He served as Head of the School of Law (2003-2005) and Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences and Law (2005-2009). Sir Malcolm is a renowned authority in the field of international law of the sea and international human rights protection, particularly torture and torture prevention and freedom of religion or belief. In 2009, he was elected member of the United Nations Subcommittee on Prevention of Torture and in 2010 elected as Chairperson. He is also a member of the UK Foreign Secretary’s Human Rights Advisory Group.

Find out more about the Commission on RE and read the Final Report on the CoRE website.