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Education and religion around the world

Reseñas

31 de Diciembre de 2016. Fuente: PewResearch Center

Resumen: Basándose en encuestas realizadas en 151 países, un estudio analiza el logro educativo entre creyentes de las principales religiones monoteístas del planeta. ¿Existirá una relación entre educación y religión? Veamos que reseña el informe del estudio.

Jews are more highly educated than any other major religious group around the world, while Muslims and Hindus tend to have the fewest years of formal schooling, according to a Pew Research Center global demographic study that shows wide disparities in average educational levels among religious groups.

These gaps in educational attainment are partly a function of where religious groups are concentrated throughout the world. For instance, the vast majority of the world’s Jews live in the United States and Israel – two economically developed countries with high levels of education overall. And low levels of attainment among Hindus reflect the fact that 98% of Hindu adults live in the developing countries of India, Nepal and Bangladesh.

But there also are important differences in educational attainment among religious groups living in the same region, and even the same country. In sub-Saharan Africa, for example, Christians generally have higher average levels of education than Muslims. Some social scientists have attributed this gap primarily to historical factors, including missionary activity during colonial times. (For more on theories about religion’s impact on educational attainment, see Chapter 7.)

Drawing on census and survey data from 151 countries, the study also finds large gender gaps in educational attainment within some major world religions. For example, Muslim women around the globe have an average of 4.9 years of schooling, compared with 6.4 years among Muslim men. And formal education is especially low among Hindu women, who have 4.2 years of schooling on average, compared with 6.9 years among Hindu men.

Yet many of these disparities appear to be decreasing over time, as the religious groups with the lowest average levels of education – Muslims and Hindus – have made the biggest educational gains in recent generations, and as the gender gaps within some religions have diminished, according to Pew Research Center’s analysis.

At present, Jewish adults (ages 25 and older) have a global average of 13 years of formal schooling, compared with approximately nine years among Christians, eight years among Buddhists and six years among Muslims and Hindus. Religiously unaffiliated adults – those who describe their religion as atheist, agnostic or “nothing in particular” – have spent an average of nine years in school, a little less than Christian adults worldwide.1

But the number of years of schooling received by the average adult in all the religious groups studied has been rising in recent decades, with the greatest overall gains made by the groups that had lagged furthest behind.

For instance, the youngest Hindu adults in the study (those born between 1976 and 1985) have spent an average of 7.1 years in school, nearly double the amount of schooling received by the oldest Hindus in the study (those born between 1936 and 1955). The youngest Muslims have made similar gains, receiving approximately three more years of schooling, on average, than their counterparts born a few decades earlier, as have the youngest Buddhists, who acquired 2.5 more years of schooling.

Over the same time frame, by contrast, Christians gained an average of just one more year of schooling, and Jews recorded an average gain of less than half a year of additional schooling.

Meanwhile, the youngest generation of religiously unaffiliated adults – sometimes called religious “nones” – in the study has gained so much ground (2.9 more years of schooling than the oldest generation of religious “nones” analyzed) that it has surpassed Christians in average number of years of schooling worldwide (10.3 years among the youngest unaffiliated adults vs. 9.9 years among the youngest Christians).

Gender gaps also are narrowing somewhat. In the oldest generation, across all the major religious groups, men received more years of schooling, on average, than women. But the youngest generations of Christian, Buddhist and unaffiliated women have achieved parity with their male counterparts in average years of schooling. And among the youngest Jewish adults, Jewish women have spent nearly one more year in school, on average, than Jewish men.

These are among the key findings of Pew Research Center’s new demographic study. A prior study by researchers at an Austrian institute, the Wittgenstein Centre for Demography and Human Capital, looked at differences in educational attainment by age and gender.2 The new study is the first comprehensive examination of differences in educational levels by religion. Wittgenstein Centre researchers Michaela Potančoková and Marcin Stonawski collaborated with Pew Research Center researchers to compile and standardize this data.

Religions vary in educational attainment

About one-in-five adults globally – but twice as many Muslims and Hindus – have received no schooling at all

Despite recent gains by young adults, formal schooling is neither universal nor equal around the world. The global norm is barely more than a primary education – an average of about eight years of formal schooling for men and seven years for women.

At the high end of the spectrum, 14% of adults ages 25 and older (including 15% of men and 13% of women) have a university degree or some other kind of higher education, such as advanced vocational training after high school. But an even larger percentage – about one-in-five adults (19%) worldwide, or more than 680 million people – have no formal schooling at all.

Education levels vary a great deal by religion. About four-in-ten Hindus (41%) and more than one-third of Muslims (36%) in the study have no formal schooling. In other religious groups, the shares without any schooling range from 10% of Buddhists to 1% of Jews, while a majority of Jewish adults (61%) have post-secondary degrees.3

Hindus and Muslims have made big advances in educational attainment

The study finds the religious groups with the lowest levels of education are also the ones that have made the biggest gains in educational attainment in recent decades.

Over three recent generations, the share of Hindus with at least some formal schooling rose by 28 percentage points, from 43% among the oldest Hindus in the study to 71% among the youngest. Muslims, meanwhile, registered a 25-point increase, from 46% among the oldest Muslims to 72% among the youngest.

Christians, Buddhists and religious “nones” have made more modest gains in basic education, but they started from a higher base. Among the oldest generation in the study, large majorities of these three religious groups received at least some formal education; among the youngest Christians, Buddhists and religious “nones,” more than nine-in-ten have received at least some schooling.

The share of Jews with at least some schooling has remained virtually universal across generations at 99%.

Declining gender gaps in formal education

In this study, more women than men have no formal education: As of 2010, an estimated 432 million women (23% of all women ages 25 and older) and 250 million men (14% of all men) lacked any formal education.

In some religious groups, the gender gaps in acquiring any formal education are particularly large. For example, just over half of Hindu women (53%) have received no formal schooling, compared with 29% of Hindu men, a difference of 24 percentage points. Among Muslims worldwide, 43% of women and 30% of men have no formal schooling, a 13-point gap. In other religions, the gender differences in the shares with no formal schooling are smaller, ranging from 9 points among the religiously unaffiliated to just 1 point among Jews.

But Hindus have substantially narrowed the gender gap in primary schooling, as shares of Hindu women with no formal schooling decreased across the three generations studied. Among the oldest Hindus, 72% of women and 41% of men have no formal schooling. But among the youngest Hindus in the study, the gender gap is smaller, as 38% of women and 20% of men have no formal schooling.

Muslims also have reduced the gender gap across generations by 11 percentage points. But in the youngest generation, a 10-point difference remains: 33% of Muslim women and 23% of Muslim men have no formal schooling. Among religiously unaffiliated adults and Buddhists worldwide, meanwhile, the gender gap in the shares with no formal schooling has virtually disappeared.

Reversal of some gender gaps in higher education

Worldwide, among all adults in the study, slightly more men than women hold post-secondary degrees (15% vs. 13%). But across generations, women have been outpacing men in reaching higher levels of education. As a result, in the youngest generation, the share of women with post-secondary degrees is comparable to the share of men (17% each).

In the youngest generation of three faith groups – Jews, Christians and the religiously unaffiliated – the gender gap in higher education has actually reversed. The biggest reversal has happened among Jews. Among the oldest generation of Jews, more men (66%) than women (59%) hold post-secondary degrees. But among the youngest Jewish adults worldwide, 69% of women and 57% of men have such degrees. In other words, a 7-point gender gap in the oldest generation (with more men than women holding advanced degrees) is now a 12-point gender gap in the other direction, with more women than men in the youngest generation of Jews holding degrees. (See Chapter 6 for details.)

Christians and religiously unaffiliated people have experienced similar – although not as dramatic – reversals of the gender gap in post-secondary education. Among Christians, the gender gap among those in the oldest adult cohort – 21% of men with higher education vs. 17% of women – has flipped among the youngest so that more women than men now hold degrees (25% of women vs. 20% of men). Similarly, among religiously unaffiliated people, the 3-point gender gap in the oldest generation (with more men than women having higher education) is now a 3-point gap in the other direction in the youngest generation, with more women than men earning post-secondary degrees.

Meanwhile, the gender gap in higher education has narrowed for Buddhists (by 5 points) and Muslims (by 3 points). Among the youngest generations in those groups, roughly equal shares of women and men hold higher degrees – 19% each among Buddhists and 11% and 9% among Muslim men and women, respectively. The gender gap in post-secondary education among Hindus has held steady across generations. In the youngest cohort of Hindus, more men than women still have post-secondary degrees (17% of men vs. 11% of women).

Both religion and region matter for educational attainment

Within the world’s major religious groups, there are often large variations in educational attainment depending on the country or region of the world in which adherents live. Muslims in Europe, for example, have more years of schooling, on average, than Muslims in the Middle East. This is because education levels are affected by many factors other than religion, including socioeconomic conditions, government resources and migration policies, the presence or absence of armed conflict and the prevalence of child labor and marriage.

At the same time, this study finds that even under the same regional or national conditions, there often are differences in education attainment among those within religious groups. Here are some findings from this report that illustrate both the diversity within the same religious group across different regions of the world, and the diversity within the same region among religious groups:

  • There is a large and pervasive gap in educational attainment between Muslims and Christians in sub-Saharan Africa. By all attainment measures, Muslim adults in the region – both women and men – are far less educated than their Christian counterparts. For instance, Muslims are more than twice as likely as Christians in sub-Saharan Africa to have no formal schooling (65% vs. 30%). Moreover, despite growth in the share of adults with any formal schooling in recent decades, the Muslim-Christian attainment gap has widened across generations, largely because Muslims have not kept pace with educational gains made by Christians. (See Chapter 1 for more on the Muslim-Christian gap in sub-Saharan Africa, and Chapter 7 for a discussion of possible explanations.)
  • Also in sub-Saharan Africa, the Muslim gender gap in education has remained largely unchanged across generations – and even widened slightly by some measures of attainment analyzed in this study. Although the youngest Muslim women in this region are making educational gains compared with their elders, they are making them at a slightly slower rate than their male peers. This pattern differs from some other regions, where Muslim women are generally making educational gains at a faster pace than Muslim men, thus narrowing the gender gap. (See Chapter 1 for details.)
  • Christians have remained fairly stable at the global level in their overall educational attainment over three generations. But their attainment varies considerably by region. As the largest of the world’s major religious groups (numbering about 2.2 billion overall, including children, as of 2010), Christians also are the most widely dispersed faith group, with hundreds of millions of adherents in sub-Saharan Africa, the Asia-Pacific, Europe, North America and Latin America and the Caribbean. Christians in Europe and North America tend to be much more highly educated than those in sub-Saharan Africa, for instance, although African Christians are making rapid educational gains across generations. (See Chapter 2 for more detail on educational attainment among Christians.)
  • Jews also have remained stable in their already high levels of educational attainment over recent generations. But Jews, unlike Christians, are a much smaller and more localized population, with a large majority of all Jews worldwide living in just two countries – Israel and the United States – where educational attainment is relatively high overall. (Chapter 6 explores data on Jews in more detail.)
  • At the global level, religiously unaffiliated adults have 1.3 more years of schooling, on average, than religiously affiliated adults (8.8 versus 7.5). One possible reason for this is that unaffiliated people are disproportionately concentrated in countries with relatively high overall levels of educational attainment, while the religiously affiliated are more dispersed across countries with both high and low levels of attainment. However, the unaffiliated are not consistently better educated than their religiously affiliated compatriots when looked at country by country. In the 76 countries with data available on the youngest generation of unaffiliated adults (born 1976-1985), they have a similar number of years of schooling as their religiously affiliated peers in 33 countries; they are less educated in 27 countries, and they are more highly educated than the affiliated in 16 countries. (See sidebar in Chapter 3 for more details on the unaffiliated and secularization theory.)
  • Hindus in India, who make up a large majority of the country’s population (and more than 90% of the world’s Hindus), have relatively low levels of educational attainment – a nationwide average of 5.5 years of schooling. While they are more highly educated than Muslims in India (14% of the country’s population), they lag behind Christians (2.5% of India’s population). By contrast, fully 87% of Hindus living in North America hold post-secondary degrees – a higher share than any other major religious group in the region. (See Chapter 5 on Hindu educational attainment.)
  • Religious minorities often have more education, on average, than a country’s majority religious group, particularly when the minority group is largely foreign born and comes from a distant country. In these cases, immigrants often were explicitly selected under immigration policies that favor highly skilled applicants. In addition, it is often the well-educated who manage to overcome the financial and logistical challenges faced by those who wish to leave their homeland for a new, far-off country. For instance, in the U.S., where Christians make up the majority of the adult population, Hindus and Muslims are much more likely than Christians to have post-secondary degrees. And unlike Christians, large majorities of Hindus and Muslims were born outside the United States (87% of Hindus and 64% of Muslims compared with 14% of Christians, according to a 2014 Pew Research Center survey). 4

A note about this analysis

This report looks at average educational levels among adherents of five major world religions – Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism and Judaism – as well as among the religiously unaffiliated.

Educational systems vary enormously around the world; this report does not attempt to analyze differences in educational quality, but focuses primarily on educational attainment in terms of number of years of schooling. It distinguishes among four broad levels of educational attainment: no formal schooling (less than one year of primary school), primary education (completion of at least one grade of primary school), some secondary education (but no degree beyond high school) and post-secondary education (completion of some kind of college, university or vocational degree beyond high school, also referred to in this report as “higher education”). For comparability across countries, these educational categories are based on the International Standard Classification of Education (ISCED 1997; see Methodology for more details).

To measure changes over recent generations, the report looks at three birth cohorts: the “oldest” (born 1936-1955), “middle” (born 1956-1975) and “youngest” (born 1976-1985). These generations roughly correspond, respectively, to people ages 55 to 74, 35 to 54 and 25 to 34 as of 2010, the most recent year for which detailed census data are available in many countries. Whenever this report refers to “adults,” it means people who were 25 or older in 2010 (or, in some cases, the most recent year for which data are available).

The report presents figures at the global and regional levels but also includes select country-level data as illustrations of larger trends. It includes data from 151 countries, collectively representing 95% of the 3.6 billion people around the world who were 25 or older in 2010. Analyses of change across generations include data from 130 countries with available data on all three birth cohorts, representing 87% of the world’s population in 2010 ages 25 to 74.

The approach in this report is primarily descriptive: It lays out the differences in educational levels among religious groups without attempting to explain the reasons for those differences. Chapter 7 outlines some of the ways that social scientists think religion may influence educational attainment.

In this study, the world is divided into six regions. It includes data from 35 countries in the Asia-Pacific region; 36 countries in Europe, including Russia; 30 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean, including Central America and Mexico; 12 countries in the Middle East-North Africa region; Canada and the United States in North America; and 36 countries in sub-Saharan Africa.

Countries with data on religion and educational attainment

Fuente: http://www.pewforum.org/2016/12/13/religion-and-education-around-the-world/

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Agenda 2030, el desafío del primer año de implementación

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Naciones Unidas, 31 de diciembre de 2016. Fuente: Prensa Latina (PL)
La comunidad internacional enfrentó durante 2016 el reto de avanzar en la implementación de la Agenda 2030 de Desarrollo Sostenible.

Esta es una ambiciosa plataforma lanzada desde Naciones Unidas para transformar el mundo en un lugar de progreso humano inclusivo y armonía con la naturaleza.

Adoptada en septiembre de 2015 por los 193 Estados miembros de la ONU, la nueva agenda, que da continuidad a las metas del milenio fijadas para el período 2000-2015, consiste en 17 objetivos de desarrollo para los próximos 15 años, con la erradicación de la pobreza y la reducción de las desigualdades como centro.

A juicio del asesor especial del Secretario General de las Naciones Unidas para la Agenda 2030 y el cambio climático, David Nabarro, aunque resta un largo camino por andar, el año que concluye deja significativos progresos.

‘Creo que lo más importante es que los gobiernos han reaccionado de una manera muy favorable, porque han colocado los objetivos de desarrollo sostenible en la prioridad de su gestión’, afirmó en entrevista con Prensa Latina.

 

De acuerdo con el experto, se apreció interés en internacionalizar la meta de no dejar a nadie atrás, consigna que guía la agenda, algo fundamental en un mundo de tantas diferencias entre ricos y pobres.

Necesitamos a partir de ahora el compromiso de los líderes mundiales y el decisivo aporte de todas las sociedades, para traducir en realidad los 17 objetivos trazados en septiembre de 2015, advirtió el médico británico, encargado de coordinar los esfuerzos para derrotar la epidemia de ébola en África Occidental y con la responsabilidad actual de hacer lo mismo con el cólera en Haití.

Nabarro consideró que el éxito de alcanzar las transformaciones propuestas pasa por una alianza entre los gobiernos, la sociedad civil, el sector privado y los académicos, con la cual los jóvenes se sientan plenamente identificados.

LO QUE BUSCA CAMBIAR LA AMBICIOSA AGENDA

El calificativo de ambiciosa encaja a la perfección en el caso de la Agenda 2030 de Desarrollo Sostenible, a partir del enorme sufrimiento humano que intenta superar.

Erradicar la pobreza en todas sus formas, el primero de los 17 objetivos, representa un complejo reto, porque el flagelo azota en su variante más extrema a 830 millones de personas; mientras la eliminación del hambre -la segunda meta- busca poner fin a la situación que viven alrededor de 800 millones de seres humanos.

La mayoría de los afectados por la pobreza extrema y la carencia de alimentos residen en los países en desarrollo.

Según la ONU, anualmente mueren más de seis millones de niños menores de cinco años, la mitad de ellos por una pobre nutrición, fenómeno concentrado en África Subsahariana y el sur del continente asiático.

No menos urgente y difícil resulta materializar los objetivos del acceso inclusivo a la salud, la educación y la sanidad, así como el empoderamiento de la mujer y la igualdad de género.

Las estadísticas de Naciones Unidas reflejan a 57 millones de niños fuera de las aulas en el planeta, a una de cada tres féminas golpeadas por la violencia y a dos mil 400 millones de personas con falta de acceso a condiciones básicas de sanidad, en particular a baños o letrinas.

La Agenda contiene además las metas de llevar para 2030 la energía sostenible y moderna a todos, el impulso al crecimiento económico y el empleo decente, la promoción de ciudades y asentamientos humanos seguros e inclusivos y el alcance de patrones sostenibles de producción y consumo.

También establece la lucha contra el cambio climático, la protección de los océanos y los bosques, y el combate a la desertificación y la pérdida de la biodiversidad.

El secretario general de la ONU, Ban Ki-moon, aseguró que la Agenda 2030 representa una oportunidad de hacer del planeta un lugar más digno, donde desaparezca la pobreza en todas sus formas.

Por su parte, el presidente de la Asamblea General en su 71 Período de Sesiones, Peter Thomson, destacó el objetivo central de la plataforma de progreso humano, no dejar a nadie atrás en el desarrollo sostenible.

Ambos coincidieron en la importancia de la voluntad política y del compromiso de los gobiernos y de toda la sociedad, en aras de traducir en progresos concretos la agenda.

PENSAR EN LOS MÁS VULNERABLES

De acuerdo con la directora del Fondo para los Objetivos de Desarrollo Sostenible de la ONU, Paloma Durán, la implementación de los 17 objetivos constituye un desafío sin precedentes para la humanidad.

‘Lo que importa es que las personas en situación vulnerable mejoren su vida’, afirmó en entrevista con Prensa Latina.

Para la catedrática española, esa meta implica la responsabilidad de todos los países, tanto en desarrollo como industrializados, de invertir recursos y crear el clima social adecuado para la materialización de los objetivos de la Agenda 2030, una iniciativa adoptada el año pasado para reducir la pobreza y las desigualdades.

Esto requiere voluntad para la toma de decisiones, pero también posturas prácticas en sintonía con las situaciones en el terreno, subrayó.

A su juicio, se ha consolidado en este año la voluntad política de los Estados miembros de la ONU para convertir en resultados la nueva agenda, aunque es muy pronto para realizar evaluaciones sobre el progreso en la implementación.

Según Durán, el sistema de las Naciones Unidas hace su parte, trabajando en diferentes instrumentos para la correcta implementación de las metas acordadas en septiembre de 2015.

En el caso del Fondo para los Objetivos de Desarrollo Sostenible, ejecuta programas en 22 países por 70 millones de dólares, precisó.

La experta aseguró que los resultados son alentadores, porque han mejorado la vida de al menos un millón de seres humanos.

Eso es nada comparado con las necesidades existentes, pero me parece que demuestra que los que hacemos tiene un impacto real en las personas vulnerables, destacó.

Fuente noticia: http://www.prensa-latina.cu/index.php?o=rn&id=52691&SEO=agenda-2030-el-desafio-del-primer-ano-de-implementacion

Autor imagen: Paolo Calleri | Karikaturist

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La educación Budista, un éxito en los colegios públicos australianos

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Australia/29 diciembre 2016/Fuente: Insurgencia Magisterial

Brian White, presidente del Consejo Budista de Nueva Gales del Sur (Australia) ha declarado que, tan sólo en ese estado, más de tres mil alumnos de la enseñanza pública ya están estudiando budismo y el número no deja de crecer.

“Está causado por varias cosas: El creciente conocimiento de la sociedad sobre la concentración meditativa y lo beneficiosa que puede ser, y el reconocimiento de que incluso los niños de seis o siete años pueden hacer meditación durante unos minutos y beneficiarse de ello”, explica. “Pero el budismo en sí también tiene la buena fama de ser un estilo de vida pacífico y práctico”.

Según White, el consejo, que se dedica a formar a profesores que enseñen las escrituras budistas, ya tenía setenta miembros trabajando como voluntarios en Nueva Gales del Sur, pero tuvieron que reclutar a sesenta más. “Tenemos colegios en lista de espera y nos están contactando todo el tiempo diciéndonos que necesitan profesores de budismo en sus clases”, dice.

Uno de los centros con mayor demanda es el colegio público Byron Bay, donde más de 150 niños estudian budismo. Más del 25 por ciento del alumnado. Emily Coleling, coordinadora, ya ha hecho llegar una circular a los padres por si quieren presentarse como voluntarios para formarse y enseñar. “Creo que tal vez Northern Rivers sea una región de mentalidad abierta, y el budismo es una religión que se está expandiendo rápidamente”.

“Me parece desafortunado que haya gente que de la espalda al cristianismo por cualquier razón, pero el budismo parece ofrecerles algo. Muchos de los niños salen de una clase de budismo y se meten en la siguiente, así que para ellos el budismo es una posibilidad más. Después puede que vayan a clase de religión bahaí o cristiana, o a ética, y así podrán elegir por sí mismos. Eso es señal de que los padres también son de mentalidad abierta”, explica.

Anna Halafoff, veterana profesora de Sociología de la Religión en la Universidad de Deakin, dice que según las cifras del censo de 2011, el budismo es la segunda religión en Australia, tras el cristianismo: “Hay un número significativo de personas que se han convertido al budismo y que practican lo que algunos expertos llaman budistas de mesita de noche; personas que no dirían que son budistas pero les interesa la meditación y leen los libros del Dalai Lama. Pienso que el budismo ha ganado popularidad en Australia y creo que en parte tiene que ver con la imagen pública que ofrece Su Santidad, quien tiene una reputación muy positiva en este país”.

Según Halafoff, otro factor para despertar interés en el Dharma es la insatisfacción con las principales religiones occidentales: “Sabemos que hoy en día la gente tiende a tener una visión más individual de la religión; a la gente le gusta poder elegir y combinar cosas diferentes. Hay muchas cosas por las que la gente podría estar distanciándose del cristianismo, sintiéndose atraídos por otros grupos religiosos, pero puede que también alejándose de cualquier religión”.

La normativa sobre educación religiosa en los colegios públicos australianos puede variar de un estado a otro. A principios de 2016, en Victoria se eliminó cualquier educación espiritual. Sin embargo, Cecilia Mitra, presidenta de la Federación de Consejos Budistas Australianos, explica que la demanda en Nueva Gales del Sur podría verse reflejada en el resto del país, dado que es una cobertura que el gobierno ya ofrece. “Hay mucho interés en el estudio del budismo. Sin embargo, la Educación Religiosa Especial, que consiste en un taller de media hora a la semana a decisión del director, apenas tiene representación budista en toda la zona occidental de Australia. Los directores no se están molestando en contactar con los centros budistas y, en mi opinión, el estudio de distintas religiones es algo muy importante en las escuelas”.

Fuente:http://insurgenciamagisterial.com/la-educacion-budista-un-exito-en-los-colegios-publicos-australianos/

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Nueva Zelanda: Religious education not reflecting society

Noticias

Nueva Zelanda/Diciembre de 2016/Fuente: Otago Daily Times

RESUMEN: En la culminación de una batalla de cuatro años, el padre Jeff McClintock solicitó permiso para presentar una apelación ante la Corte Suprema de Nueva Zelanda en octubre. Su caso impugnó el derecho de la escuela de su hijo a impartir clases de instrucción religiosa cristiana durante la jornada escolar, a la luz de la Ley de Declaración de Derechos que protege la libertad de religión y creencias. Se desestimó por no haber «asunto de importancia pública» en juego o «apariencia de error judicial» si no se concedía el recurso.

In  the culmination of a four-year battle, parent Jeff McClintock sought permission to bring an appeal to the Supreme Court of New Zealand in October. His case contested the right of his child’s school to hold Christian religious instruction classes during the school day, in the light of the Bill of Rights Act which protects freedom of religion and belief. It was dismissed on grounds of there being no «matter of public importance» at stake or «any appearance of a miscarriage of justice» if the appeal were not granted.

The legislation upon which current practices are based is 52 years old.

The issue of religion in education has long been ducked by government and by most educationalists. But immigration has brought a great increase in religious diversity – particularly to New Zealand’s cities where the majority of children live.

Here’s the problem. The Churches Education Commission (CEC) has a legal right to promote Christian beliefs in state primary schools under Section 78 of the 1964 Education Act, if boards of trustees are agreeable. Legislators in the early 1960s rightly assumed religious instruction by church volunteers would meet the approval of the vast majority of parents. At a time when about 90% of the population affiliated to Christianity, Bible in Schools had «social legitimacy». It met a social need. It is much harder to make a case for the social legitimacy of Christian instruction in state schools today.

In order to reconcile religious instruction with the secular education system established by the 1877 Education Act, the idea of school closure was introduced into this legislation. At any time of the school day a classroom could be deemed to be legally «closed» (while actually open) for religious instruction. This arguably has had at least two unforeseen and unintended consequences. Firstly, the separation of religion from the secular curriculum appears to prevent young people in state schools from learning about religions and beliefs.

Teachers and principals interviewed felt the subject of religion was «best avoided» by class teachers, in case of inadvertent indoctrination or causing offence. Some felt the subject was taboo, illegal, or irrelevant in a secular school.

Few made the distinction between religious instruction into a belief, and religious education about a variety of religious world-views. This distinction had not been made clear during teachers’ training or professional development. This means young people are not being given the opportunity to develop religious literacy: they learn to tolerate but not to understand the diverse beliefs making up New Zealand society.

Secondly, that the school was legally closed for Bible in Schools appeared, to a large degree, to allow educationalists to sidestep responsibility for monitoring CEC programmes and resources.

Representatives at the ministry and the NZEI stated they could not be held responsible for an activity outside the curriculum. Some teachers and principals argued they had no responsibility to provide information to parents about Bible in Schools because the school was closed for that lesson.

Because the programme is outside the curriculum, the Education Review Office does not check that parents are consulted frequently or that programmes are appropriate.

Constraints surrounding informed consent, opting-out and complaint processes for parents are numerous. Contrary to the judges’ statement in the McClintock case, my PhD research argues these are issues of public importance and matters of justice are at stake.

It appears religion in state primary schools has been insulated from international developments in religious education. From the 1960s, educationalists in many other plural liberal democracies have been developing appropriate ways to teach about religious diversity at every age of schooling. Immigration policy in New Zealand has created a religiously plural society. Education policy and practice does not adequately reflect this. It’s time for a review of legislation and practice and a debate about religions and beliefs as part of the curriculum.

Fuente: https://www.odt.co.nz/opinion/religious-education-not-reflecting-nz-society

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Los cristianos de todo el mundo celebran el nacimiento de Jesús

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24 de diciembre de 2016/ Autor: GONZALO MUÑOZ

Los cristianos de todo el mundo, católicos, protestantes, ortodoxos, anglicanos, coptos… millones en los cinco continentes, muchos de ellos perseguidos por sus creencias religiosas, celebran hoy el Nacimiento de Jesús de Nazaret.

Pero el día exacto del nacimiento de la figura que da origen a su fe no ha quedado registrado en la Biblia.

El Evangelio narra la historia del nacimiento de Jesús, en tiempos del emperador romano Augusto César, y del rey judío Herodes, en una aldea llamada Belén en la región de Judea, bajo la autoridad civil del gobernador de Siria, de nombre Cirenio. Todos estos nombres son de personas y sitios reales, que pasaron a formar parte de la Historia.

Los historiadores coinciden en que era costumbre del Imperio Romano imponer por la fuerza una rigurosa administración en los territorios conquistados. No era raro que, por esa razón, el Emperador ordenase censos fiscales cada vez que lo considerase oportuno. Este era uno de esos casos y, entre todos los habitantes que debían empadronarse estaba el joven matrimonio de José y María.

Desde su casamiento vivían en Nazaret, en la región de Galilea, donde José tenía su taller de carpintería; y María estaba embarazada de su primer hijo. Así y todo, tuvieron que recorrer unos 110 kilómetros hacia el sur, para cumplir con el censo en la “ciudad de David”, pues ambos eran descendientes del rey más amado en Israel. Como todos los albergues y posadas habían sido ocupados, a causa del censo, el matrimonio consiguió el sitio menos apropiado para una madre con trabajos de parto: un establo.

Todo lo narrado hasta aquí está en el Evangelio escrito por el médico de nombre Lucas (Cap. 1:26-80; 2:1-52) y también en el Evangelio escrito por el ex cobrador de impuestos Mateo (Cap.1:1-25; 2:1-23).

Sin embargo, el día exacto del nacimiento del Jesús no ha quedado taxativamente registrado en la Biblia; tampoco en la historia secular.

¿Nació Jesús el 24 o el 25 de diciembre?

Hay sobrados motivos para pensar que no fue en ninguna de esas dos tradicionales fechas. No tenemos ninguna información acerca de que los primeros cristianos celebrasen la Navidad, en los tres primeros siglos de la iglesia; menos, que el día de nacimiento fuese en el mes de diciembre, cuando es invierno en esa región.

La costumbre pastoril en época de primavera y verano en la antigua Palestina, era la de hacer pastar a los rebaños en corrales de campo con pasturas en las noches de temperatura templada o suave. En esos días no guardaban a sus ovejas en el establo que usaban en otoño, invierno y días inclementes. Porque estaban afuera, cuidando el rebaño de los lobos, los pastores vieron a los ángeles cantando la buena noticia de que un Salvador había nacido en la ciudad de David.

Por lo tanto, puede inferirse que sólo podría haber ocurrido hasta alrededor del 21 de setiembre, que es cuando comienza el otoño en esa región.

¿Por qué entonces diciembre?

La información que existe de una fiesta próxima a la Navidad es la del 18 de diciembre, cuando se celebraba el solsticio de invierno, llamada «Sol Invictus», un culto al sol proveniente de la antigua Babilonia. Es bien sabido que el típico sincretismo del Imperio Romano les llevaba a incorporar rituales de las culturas propias de los países que dominaban. Ese día era propicio para sus orgías, en las que el sentido común y la razón eran adormecidos.

Como  el mismo periódico del Vaticano L’Osservatore Romano explica, “la fecha del 25 de diciembre como fecha del nacimiento de Jesús fue escogida por la Iglesia de Roma pagana. Este día estaba dedicado al dios Sol. Aunque el cristianismo ya estaba asentado en Roma a partir del edicto de Constantino, el mito del dios Sol todavía estaba muy difundido, especialmente entre los soldados romanos. Las festividades que giraban en torno al 25 de diciembre estaban tan arraigadas en la tradición popular que la Iglesia de Roma pensó darle a esa fecha un sentido religioso cristiano”. Para ello, se sustituyó al dios Sol por Jesucristo, el verdadero Sol de Justicia para los cristianos.

Hasta aquí los hechos históricos.

Sin embargo, los cristianos no celebran una fecha, sino un evento en lo que consideran la historia de la salvación que da sentido a su fe. De ahí que no sea relevante en su creencias que aquél a quien consideran su Salvador haya nacido un 24 o 25 de diciembre, 21 siglos atrás

¿Una fiesta necesaria?

“La  Navidad es una fiesta necesaria; necesitamos un aniversario durante el cual podamos lamentar todas las imperfecciones de nuestras relaciones humanas. Es la fiesta del fracaso, triste pero consoladora”, escribió Graham Greene.

Fuente del Reportaje:

http://www.teinteresa.es/cultura/cristianos-mundo-celebran-nacimiento-Jesus_0_1711028884.html

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Nueva Zelanda: Secular Education Network appeals bible battle to UN committee

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Nueva Zelanda/Diciembre de 2016/Fuente: Stuff

RESUMEN: Bajo la Ley de Educación, las escuelas primarias pueden cerrar por hasta una hora cada semana para clases de instrucción religiosa. Un grupo que lucha contra las clases bíblicas en las escuelas primarias está presionando para que las Naciones Unidas examinen la discriminación religiosa en Nueva Zelanda. La Secular Education Network cree que las clases tienen un impacto negativo en los estudiantes no cristianos, y no tienen lugar en un marco de educación secular. Eso es discutido por la Comisión de Educación de Iglesias – el mayor proveedor de instrucción religiosa en el país – que dice que la prohibición de las clases bíblicas sería una violación de los derechos humanos.

A group fighting against bible classes in primary schools is pushing for the United Nations to examine religious discrimination in New Zealand.

The Secular Education Network believes the classes have a negative impact on non-Christian students, and have no place in a secular education framework.

That is disputed by the Churches Education Commission – the largest provider of religious instruction in the country – which says that banning bible classes would be a breach of human rights.

Now, the network wants the issue taken up by the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.

The committee will be reviewing New Zealand’s human rights record next year, along with the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, and the Human Rights Commission is currently collecting submissions.

Under the Education Act, teaching in primary schools must be entirely secular. However they’re permitted to close for up to one hour a week, for the purpose of religious instruction.

Around 40 per cent of New Zealand primary schools engage in some form of religious instruction, while the rest are entirely secular.

Karl Le Quesne, head of early learning and student achievement at the Ministry of Education, says any religious programme must be approved by a school’s board of trustees.

«Schools may not discriminate against their students on the grounds of their religious belief or lack of it,» he said.

The network’s David Hines is concerned that while that may be the law, the reality is that students still experience discrimination in the classroom.

«When kids don’t attend the religious instruction class they, in many cases, get bullied by other kids,» he said.

«That scares a lot of kids and their parents, so they don’t complain about it.»

The commission’s Tracy Kirkley is disappointed by reports of students feeling ostracised, and insists that is not the intention of religious instruction.

«It’s a concern if kids are feeling that way,» she said.

«We’re obviously concerned about that, and that’s certainly something that we would not in any way encourage.»

Kirkley believes banning religious instruction would be a step in the wrong direction, and said the commission will make its own submission to the UN committee.

«To us it’s about maintaining and protecting the freedoms we enjoy in this country,» she said.

«There are mechanisms for people to choose whether their kids are in programmes, that’s the whole point of a democracy.»

But scrapping religious instruction entirely is exactly what Hines would like to see, especially given the changing demographics of New Zealand.

«If the present slide goes on, the non-religious people could well outnumber the number of Christians by the next census,» he said.

Kirkley concedes his point, and acknowledges that requests for religious instruction classes have dropped over the past few years.

«The face of New Zealand society has become a lot more diverse and multicultural, we totally understand that,» she said.

However Kirkley said the commission will continue offering religious instruction as long as there is demand from schools.

Submissions to the UN committee close in August 2017.

Fuente: http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/education/87627929/secular-education-network-appeals-bible-battle-to-un-committee

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Do Australian schools need more money, or better spending?

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Australia/Diciembre de 2016/Autora: Catherine Hanrahan /Fuente: ABC News

RESUMEN: Dos informes internacionales muestran los niveles de educación de Australia han caído en el ranking mundial – superada por Kazajstán – y los últimos datos de Australia muestran resultados plana de revestimiento de los estudiantes. Pero lo que ha causado la caída?

Educación acalorado debate menudo de Australia ha tendido a centrarse en dos cuestiones fundamentales:

La cantidad de escuelas de financiación reciben; y
La creciente brecha entre los más ricos y las escuelas más pobres.

¿Qué puede el último Programa de Resultados Evaluación de Estudiantes (PISA) nos dicen acerca de estos factores?

Two international reports show Australia’s education standards have dropped down the global rankings — overtaken by Kazakhstan — and the latest Australian data show students’ results flat-lining.

But what has caused the fall?

Australia’s often heated education debate has tended to centre on two key issues:

  • How much funding schools receive; and
  • The widening divide between the richest and poorest schools.

What can the latest Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) results tell us about these factors?

Globally, countries that spend more get better results

There is a clear relationship between spending and performance in the PISA data: countries that spend more score higher results.

In the chart below, each country in the PISA tables is represented by a circle:

  • those with better maths scores appear higher up the chart; and
  • those that spend more per student appear further to the right.

Australia appears just above the trend line: it spends about $92,000 per student (from the age of six to 15) and the average maths test score was 494.

These broad trends were repeated for reading and science.

But the relationship between spending and performance is not a simple one

Many countries that got similar average maths scores spent very different amounts on education — and many countries that spent about the same had very different scores.

For example, Australia’s score in maths is better than the UK and the US, which each spent more per student.

But Australia’s score is well below Korea, Estonia and Poland, who spent between $12,000 and $28,000 less on each student than Australia did.

Overall, the relationship between spending and results was not significant once spending per student passed above US$50,000.

In other words, take out the countries that are not spending very much, and the correlation between spending and performance disappears.

This tallies with Education Minister Simon Birmingham’s comments that Australian school funding is at record levels and the focus can no longer be on how much money is being spent.

So how can Australia improve its schools?

Pete Goss from the Grattan Institute says that what matters most for Australia now is not how much money goes into education, but how the money is spent.

«To make sure money is well spent, step one is to distribute to the schools who need it most,» he said.

«Step two is that whatever money schools get, it must be spent as effectively as possible on teaching approaches that have been shown to work and are cost effective.

«One side of politics seems to focus more on step one, where money is distributed. The other side focuses more on step two, how money is spent.

«We have to get both right.»

Laura Perry, associate professor of education policy at Murdoch University, says Australian education has a «distribution problem rather than an absolute funding problem».

«The biggest problem … is we don’t give as much money to the schools that really need it and we tend to give money to the schools that don’t need it,» she said.

Does the data back up this inequality story?

Globally, the PISA data shows that students who are at a socio-economic disadvantage are almost three times more likely to fail to reach a baseline skill level in science.

A ‘fair’ education system was defined as one where a student’s result reflects their ability, rather than things they can’t control, like their socio-economic status.

On some measures of fairness, Australia fell below the average among the 35 OECD countries being compared.

The chart below includes all the countries that scored higher than Australia in science.

Only three — New Zealand, Singapore and Taipei — gave a greater benefit to advantaged students than Australia did.

Coming from an advantaged background in Australia adds 44 points to a student’s science score for every unit increase in socio-economic advantage.

In many countries, including Vietnam, Canada and China, education was more equal than in Australia.

What’s the result of unequal schooling?

The difference in education equality in different countries is most obvious in how the bottom quarter of students fares in each country.

Although Australia’s bottom and top quarter of students are performing better than the OECD average, the bottom quarter is performing much worse than the bottom quarter in Singapore, Vietnam, Estonia and Japan.

Professor Perry says Canada is the most relevant comparison to Australia.

«We can say that low socio-economic status students … perform much better in Canada than Australia,» she said.

«If you look at the total average [score] for each country, it’s higher in Canada and that’s the main reason why.»

Australia worst in OECD on staffing gap

Professor Perry says one of the explanations for the poor performance of Australia’s lowest socio-economic students is their poor access to qualified teachers.

The gap between rich and poor schools’ ability to attract qualified teachers in Australia is the largest in the OECD.

The data was gathered by asking principals how much their school’s ability to teach students was affected by having unqualified or poorly qualified teachers.

Australian principals in schools in high socio-economic areas gave very different answers from those in poorer areas.

Shortages of qualified teachers were more likely in Australian public schools than private schools.

The same goes for education materials — things like IT equipment, classroom and laboratory materials. Only Mexico, Spain and Turkey had a more unequal split in terms of access to material.

Sue Thompson, director of educational monitoring for the Australian Council for Educational Research, says lots of students, particularly in junior secondary school, are being taught by teachers out of their field of expertise.

One Australian study showed that about 38 per cent of students were being taught by teachers not qualified in maths and science.

These teachers are limited both in their ability to find ways to teach the bottom-performing students, and to challenge the top students, Dr Thompson says.

«All of the OECD research on disadvantaged students shows that by lifting the success of disadvantaged students, you would increase the system as a whole but also you gain on the performance of the high-achieving students as well, as a result of better teaching,» she said.

Professor Perry says the amount of social segregation between schools has become a «vicious cycle» in Australia: as teacher shortages become more pronounced in lower socio-economic schools, parents choose to avoid those schools, perpetuating the problem.

«A low socio-economic school, another word for that is a hard-to-staff school,» she said.

Fuente: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-12-13/australian-school-results-money-inequality/8103250

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