**Parents should be free to choose the ethos of their child's school - but faith schools do have their issues...** - There is a strong case to suggest that the state should not be funding faith schools, as it could be argued that they encourage segregation on cultural, religious and socio-economic grounds and other people with different beliefs. Faith schools are free to not teach about other religions and may have limited sex education. [One National Secular Society study](https://www.secularism.org.uk/uploads/unsafe-sex-report-april-2018.pdf) finds that 77% of faith schools teach sex education in accordance with religious scripture. This could limit knowledge about safe sex for students who do not choose to follow these teachings, or contribute to LGBTQ+ discrimination among students by omitting information relating to them from the curriculum. - As children from faith backgrounds are given priority, people are also encouraged to baptise their children for the sake of a school place in many church schools. I think many religious and non-religious people would agree that this is problematic. - That being said, school is compulsory and parents should have the freedom to choose the ethos of the school that their child attends, without having to pay fees. Faith schools are a popular choice, accounting for about [34% of state-funded schools](https://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN06972/SN06972.pdf.) as of January 2019. It could be argued that faith schools, including independent ones, should be banned completely, however people who advocate for this usually argue that secular schools are a neutral space without any agenda, which many religious people would disagree with. - If we agree that parents should be free to bring up their children with a particular faith, then it follows that they should be able to choose a school that preaches the same values, as school is hugely formative. However, perhaps faith schools do have a stronger agenda than non-faith schools, making them less inclusive and more biased in their educational approach.

Schools in general should not get state funding.