Government launched the Respect initiative last year to "tackle bad behaviour and nurture good", and that includes a drive to improve behaviour and attendance in schools. A welcome initiative, yet it has its limits. While the Government may hope to teach respect, its failure to grasp the core of what that is will always curtail any success. The fight is not so much to nurture "good" but to nurture love.
True respect is deeply rooted in love, and this is something that does not feature too prominently on the school agenda. Schools may teach all sorts of wonderful things these days but many fail to teach the greatest wisdom of them all - "Love thy neighbour as thyself".
Faith schools are among the highest performing in the country. The latest league table of primary schools was published by the Government last December and of the 209 primaries achieving "perfect" results, Church of England, Roman Catholic and Jewish schools accounted for a considerable 127.
Jesus said we can see the tree by the fruit. I would be surprised if the soaring success rate of faith schools was unconnected to the faith at the heart of the teaching ethos. The kids might not understand all aspects of the religion but they understand the teachings - the unconditional love of God, love and forgiveness, love for every person as made in the image of God, love, love, love.
And when we think of faith schools it's easy to think only of the pupils and nothing of the teachers. But teachers in faith schools, because of their faith, often regard their positions as part of a service to God and a duty to be good role models to the children. Such an attitude, one that goes beyond the 'it's just a job' and 'they're not my kids' mentality, is bound to make a positive impression on the students.
Faith schools are underpinned by their belief in God and His love towards every single person. True respect is built on such an understanding of God and our fellow mankind.
The Government wants to teach kids something about respect but perhaps it has a lesson to learn itself. If the Government really wants to improve behaviour in our schools, then it has to do more than toughen up on disciplining the unruly kids. It must work to eradicate the very unruliness in the kids and that requires a transformation of the heart.
Faith groups recently received a boost of £4.3m to support their community cohesion building projects. It would be great to see the Government make the same investment in developing spiritual and faith-based programmes to complement the national curriculum. Happy kids will definitely make happy teachers.
