Hello one and all to another one of my blogs. I am Aus Atheist Jim and today my writings and ramblings are directed at my Australian viewers, however it could be interesting to those internationals that find education, politics, and religion an annoying bunch to mix.
Todays topic is of great disgust to many of the people I follow on twitter. It is a program that aims to force our children into the hands of a religious organization without any choice. I speak of course about the recent budget and the $245,000,000 (AUD) that has been marked for the school chaplaincy program.
Up until now the government has funded the ‘school chaplaincy and welfare worker program’. Which is to be terminated on the 31st of December 2014, with the school chaplaincy program beginning on the 1st of January 2015. From this date, schools will be able to apply for funding up to $20,000 per year ($24,000 in remote areas) to engage a chaplains services.
Unsurprisingly it isn’t a simple Google search to compare the differences between the chaplaincy and welfare program to the dedicated chaplaincy program but my understanding is that funding is no long available for secular student counselors. It does not take a genius to realize that this is a program designed to force religious beliefs on children in our public government schools. There is already one school chaplain being investigated in Brisbane for preaching after saying in his blog it is his mission to disciple others, and establish the kingdom of god in this world. My first problem with that, is that a man capable of such idiotic statements is even let on school grounds. You can read that story here .
So with the government removing secular youth workers from schools, spending $245,000,000 amid massive budget cuts, and our children being indoctrinated by gullible fools, I thought I’d take a look at what good could be done with all that money.
Youth Workers:
For 245 million, the government could hire 4000 youth workers at $60,000 per year each to service the countries 6,743 public schools and their students (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2010) or 6000 of them at $40,000 each. The Department of Educations website expects only 2,900 schools to benefit from this program, so what of the other almost 4,000 public schools? Seems a lot of money to spend on less than half the public student population doesn’t it.
Let the schools decide:
If the money allocated to this program was simply divided amongst all the schools each government school would receive approximately $36,333 each. You could restock a small yet effective library for that amount, a new computer setup for the students, or a multimedia fit out in rural schools improving distance education. Anything that isn’t praying to a magical sky daddy (and preying on children) is an improvement on the current way that money is being spent.
Child Poverty:
An estimated 575,000 children in Australia are living below the poverty line. I wonder how they could benefit from $426 each, or having programs to help them developed with that money. A man with one book and a cross doesn’t feed these children.
Single parent families:
What would a means tested payment to our nations 486,000 single parent families mean? If each family qualified it would be a $500 payment each. That’s vehicle registration for 6 months. 2 weeks rent. A months food. School supplies for their children. But I suppose these families have god and I’m sure he’s going to stop the real estate agent from evicting a young single parent family from their only safe place.
I wonder what you could do with $245,000,000 to benefit your community. I think if I had control over that kind of funding we would see certain higher education courses made readily available like paramedic, nursing, and teaching degrees to boost those industries. I would also like to see funding made available to child victims of crime for counseling and rehabilitation.
Here are a few tweets about the subject:
@jennyeather asked a fine question with her tweet
“Does $245M national school chaplaincy program mean muslim clerics, Buddhist monks and Hindu gurus can cash in, or only Christians? #auspol”
Would be interesting to see if the program is open to all religions or if this ‘help the kids’ nonsense really is just a Christian recruitment tool. Get ‘em while they’re still to young to ask to many questions is their motto isn’t it?
“The School Chaplaincy program is going to destroy lives, less kids will seek help & those who do may not get the help they need. #auspol”
“If you want to ‘fix’ the economy, get rid of the School Chaplaincy Program & tax the bloody religious institutions!”
“$243 million added to school chaplaincy progam to control thinking, $87 million cut from arts to discourage creative thought.”
All of these are excellent points, and there are many, many, many more out there with similar ideas to myself and those quoted above. The school chaplaincy program will not be seen in 4000 schools, and in the 2,900 schools it is, how many of those students will actually access the program? If every single student in a government school accessed this program it would cost $38 a head. We are paying $38 a head for a program that the vast majority of schools will not participate in, and those that do, a majority of their students wont. Those students that do participate are being counseled by people with no training, or minimal at best, representing an organization that has been the subject of child abuse allegations for decades!
If after all this you’re still not sure I feel I summed it up pretty nicely the other day
@AusAtheistJim “Imagine someone takes a chunk of your food budget and spends it on magic beans… Now you understand the school chaplaincy program.”
Well that is all from me for today. This is a topic that I could ramble on about for another few days however I’m sure the basic level of my disgust at this program has been adequately portrayed.
To continue the conversation you can leave a comment below or you can come chat with me on twitter @AusAtheistJim
If you would like references to any of the information I have listed above feel free to ask and I shall provide. I usually like to provide references at the bottom of each page however I forgot to write them down today and it was many hours of research that I don’t right now feel up to doing again.
If this blog interested you, you may be interested in another piece I did on religion in schools that you can view HERE.
Remember, this is the season for reason.
Cheers,
Aus Atheist Jim
Aus Atheist Jim 
There’s reason across the big, blue pond too, Jim. I think you folks are right to question this program and present practical alternatives. Having been a theist and now non-theist chaplain I will say that a truly inclusive chaplaincy CAN work, but these are very difficult to find, create or maintain (see the Humanist Chaplaincy at Harvard for example). I liked what I saw in Chaplains without Borders, there in AUS, but these have to be delicately balanced to serve everyone without preaching. “Presence work” can be done by non-theists as well, but I agree that secular counselors can do that for the most part. I could say more about what I consider the value of Chaplaincy, but I’ll just commend your voices there and hope more of that reasonable thinking swims over here to the big, dumbed-down “Christian Nation”!