Collective Worship

Legal requirements

All pupils at St. Philip’s School are entitled to a daily act of collective worship.

As a Church school, our collective worship should be identifiably Christian, and in accordance with;

“the faith and practice of the Church of England”.

Responsibility for the collective worship of the school lies with the governors, in consultation with the Head Teacher, Senior Management Team and Collective Worship Co-ordinator.

It should be noted that collective worship is different from an assembly, which is a gathering of the school, or part of it, for any purpose.

Background to collective worship at our school

It is a legal requirement that all registered school age students take part in an act of worship each day. These acts of worship are “wholly and of a broadly Christian Character. They must also be;

“appropriate, having regard to the ages,
aptitudes and family backgrounds of the students”.

Families who send their children to this school are in the main ‘nominally’ Christian or predominantly from non-religious backgrounds with a small minority of other faith backgrounds, including Hindu, Muslim, Jewish etc. Some children are from practising Christian families, in addition, there are children who are from religions other than Christianity and some from non-religious backgrounds.

We recognise that in asking our children to worship we have to consider the background that our children come from and it is therefore not the practice of this school to preach to or convert the children. The faith background of both the staff and the child’s family is respected at all times.

The head teacher is responsible (under the School Standards and Framework Act 1998) for arranging the daily collective worship after consulting with the governing body.

Please click here to see our Collective Worship Policy.

Please click here to see our booklet 'What is a Church school and what does it mean for my child and family?'

Our School Prayer:

As part of our collective worship in the autumn of 2020, we worked collaboratively as a school to write a school prayer. We use this in collective worship throughout the week.