White, middle-class parents find God, and a school place

In the Islington Tribune is an article White, middle-class parents find God, and a school place

Vicar says ‘divisive’ system separates Christian children from neighbours...GOD might be infinite in his wisdom, but can he tell the true believers from those earning “God miles” so they can get their children into one of Islington’s prestigious faith schools?

Um no. And the Vicar is right.

The myth of faith schools providing superior education is based on the long held view of hidden selection process in a national education sysyem that is not mean to have selection. Remove the selection bias from faith schools and they perform no better than non-faith schools. This was confirmed in the LSE study earlier this year. Of course this does not prevent parents wanting their kids to get into such a school as there is selection going on. Back to the Reverend Stephen Coles who

believes mushrooming demand for places in well-regarded Catholic and Church of England primary schools is sidelining vulnerable and disadvantaged families.

This is probably quite correct. Ironically if he succeeded in achieving his goals, then faith schools would not have a higher proportion of the socially advantaged compared to the national average, the selection bias would dissipate and the apparent educational advantage of such shcools would be shown to be a sham!