Stacmon
Explorer
Publicly Funded Islamic Madrassas (Schools) in Western Countries
I'd like to know what everyone thinks about publicly (state) funded Muslim schools. To give a bit of background, I'm Canadian and in my city (Ottawa, the capital) there are two main school systems. One is the public school system (has no religious affiliation whatsoever) while the other is the Catholic school system (almost identical to the public system but includes courses on "Religion").
Both are publicly funded, and the situation is very different from what I understand it to be in the USA. The vast majority of our public schools are of high quality and very few people, aside from the extremely well off, send their children to private schools.
Because of the increased number of Muslim immigrants, strong birth rates and a steady number of conversions (about 3,000 per year), publicly funded Islamic schools have started popping up in recent years.
These Islamic schools generally teach the same curriculum as Public or Catholic schools, but rather than a Catholic religion course, they have an Islamic religion course. Furthermore, most of them also teach the Arabic language.
I'm from a mixed Muslim/Christian background, and I see this as a just and positive development. As long as Canada accepts and provides funding to Catholic public school boards, they should do the same thing for schools of other religions, provided that enough demand exists. Anything short of that would be discriminatory and show favour to one religion over another.
What I'd like to know is how Americans, Europeans and others feel about something similar happening in their own communities, provided that the Muslim community was large enough and demand was high enough.
Edit: I'd also like to request that people post their views and comments, regardless of the way they vote. Ideally, it'll give us some idea why people are comfortable or uncomfortable with the idea.
I'd like to know what everyone thinks about publicly (state) funded Muslim schools. To give a bit of background, I'm Canadian and in my city (Ottawa, the capital) there are two main school systems. One is the public school system (has no religious affiliation whatsoever) while the other is the Catholic school system (almost identical to the public system but includes courses on "Religion").
Both are publicly funded, and the situation is very different from what I understand it to be in the USA. The vast majority of our public schools are of high quality and very few people, aside from the extremely well off, send their children to private schools.
Because of the increased number of Muslim immigrants, strong birth rates and a steady number of conversions (about 3,000 per year), publicly funded Islamic schools have started popping up in recent years.
These Islamic schools generally teach the same curriculum as Public or Catholic schools, but rather than a Catholic religion course, they have an Islamic religion course. Furthermore, most of them also teach the Arabic language.
I'm from a mixed Muslim/Christian background, and I see this as a just and positive development. As long as Canada accepts and provides funding to Catholic public school boards, they should do the same thing for schools of other religions, provided that enough demand exists. Anything short of that would be discriminatory and show favour to one religion over another.
What I'd like to know is how Americans, Europeans and others feel about something similar happening in their own communities, provided that the Muslim community was large enough and demand was high enough.
Edit: I'd also like to request that people post their views and comments, regardless of the way they vote. Ideally, it'll give us some idea why people are comfortable or uncomfortable with the idea.
