The GCSE debate: the inclusion of Humanism

The debate about the proposed GCSE criteria for RS has been professional, lively and engaging – but it has opened up some deep divisions and disagreements within our community.

It is crucial to remember that so far we have been presented with criteria not course specifications and the exam boards have the opportunity to be creative. And there is still plenty of time to respond to the consultation.

I am not sure whether we can rely on the Boards to be creative OR how far we need to amend the criteria to foster that creativity – both I suspect. What follows is a general contribution to the discussions.

My previous blog https://www.reonline.org.uk/blog/those-gcse-proposals-a-lament-for-lucy-jo/ suggested areas that need to be improved – particularly around reducing the massive content overload, making the study of the religions more exciting and challenging, forging stronger links between the study of religions and philosophy/ethics, and incorporating more themes which explore the nature, purpose and value of religion itself.

My purpose in the next three blogs is to try to map the landscape of the debate a little more and maybe help us come closer together in our thinking.

There are three areas I want to touch on over the next few days:

• The inclusion of humanism
• The ‘problem’ of philosophy and ethics
• The resistance to studying religion

The Inclusion of humanism

First let me put my cards on the table. I would describe myself as a humanist and come from a very strongly humanist family background. In that personal capacity I have thrown my support behind the inclusion of humanism in the subject content at GCSE alongside the study of religions.

However, I think there are alternative ways of thinking about the inclusion of humanism at GCSE. Two points:

1. Even amongst the strong supporters of the place of humanism within RE, there is concern that if humanism is included as an option to study as one of the two ‘religions and beliefs’ it would have the effect of unbalancing the overall intention of the proposals. If humanism were selected, students would only study one of the major world religions (probably in most cases Christianity or Islam). This would restrict students’ understanding of the distinctive, complex, controversial and diverse world of religion. Humanists are clear they are not a religion – as such they don’t have some of the features which characterise religions. Humanism is light on myths and rituals, patterns of devotion, the use of symbolic language to represent the idea of the divine etc.

2. But far more important – Studying humanist and secular thought shouldn’t be optional at GCSE – it should be a requirement! Humanist and secular thought permeates modern life. Our scientific, political, economic, social and educational discourses are now radically secular and humanistic. Crucially, you cannot make sense of religion in modern Britain and beyond unless you understand how much contemporary religious thinking and practice is a response to the humanist and secular worldview that permeates our life. In some cases religions have sought to embrace that worldview; in other cases, they have sought to challenge and ‘do battle’. In the end, most contemporary religious debates are about the relationship between the religion and that humanist, secular worldview. You can’t study religion in the modern world properly if you don’t grasp the key features of humanist, secular thinking. So a unit of humanist and secular thought should be a required feature of any GCSE in religious studies – I would suggest as a compulsory theme in Part 2 of the subject content. Its nearly there in the theme on ‘dialogue within and between religious and non-religious beliefs’ – but that’s an option and not quite strong enough.