This document has been produced by the Accord Coalition, of which Ekklesia is a founder member, to help researchers, journalists, campaigners and members of the public to find information about some of the policy implications of state funded faith schools and their practices. The aim is to bring together and summarise high quality research from reliable sources, pointing in particular to the shortcomings of faith schools and where changes need to made, particularly in the area of admissions and employment. With the exception of the 2009 poll commissioned by Accord from YouGov—itself a respected member of the British Polling Council—all evidence in the report is from sources independent of Accord and its members. Some sources cited however are religious, such as agency Tearfund, and other institutions that work with churches such as the Runnymede Trust. The evidence is also recent - all of it dates from 2001 or later and the majority was produced in the last two years. Research and opinion polls have been organised in reverse chronological order below, followed by relevant parliamentary questions and statistics from the DCSF.

Topics covered include:

• The impact of religious admissions on social segregation (sometimes called “cream skimming” or social selection)
• Faith schools and school standards / attainment
• Faith schools and community cohesion
• The number of new faith schools
• Faith schools and homophobia
• Faith schools and recruitment
• The number of schools of different types, and their denominations

Although the scope of evidence surveyed here is wide and cannot easily be summarised, it repeatedly gives cause for concern about the way that many faith schools operate, and the consequences of this for wider society. The polls and surveys in the report demonstrate that many members of the public have similar concerns as Accord, which is convinced that only legislative change will bring about an education system free from religious discrimination.