Across the UK, there are thousands of schools of religious character - Jewish, Muslim, Catholic and Anglican. Some represent a careful mix of belief and culture; others develop a religious identity for particular children. NCSL's seminar work has aimed to explore the common issues and challenges across all schools of a religious character and to consider opportunities for further networking and development.
Leadership and spirituality 
(432kb, 7 pages)
John West-Burnham's thinkpiece from the first seminar in 2002 encourages a way of understanding the place of spirituality within a model of personal effectiveness by seeing it as a fundamental component of personal capital, in symbiotic interaction with emotional capacity and the capacity for learning to create knowledge. It is important to recognise at the outset that any understanding of spirituality cannot have exclusively religious connotations but embraces a broader concept of 'secular spirituality'. Within this context:
"Spirituality is the journey to find a sustainable, authentic and profound understanding of the existential self which informs personal and social action."
The following three documents are from the seminar held in 2004.
A culture of hope? Priorities and vision in church schools (95kb, 5 pages)
Speech by Dr Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury to The Association of Anglican Secondary School Heads' Annual Conference in 2003.
Leading schools of a religious character: thoughts on being a faith school (50kb, 1 page)
Thinkpiece by Chief Rabbi Dr Jonathan Sacks.
What should be distinctive about the leadership of schools with religious character? (67kb, 1 page)
Thinkpiece by Vincent Nicholls, Archbishop of Birmingham.
Further publications and resources about faith schools and diversity issues can be found by visiting our publications pages.
find us | press office | vacancies | learning and conference centre | about this site | legal | site map
© National College for School Leadership
