Uwagi do projektu rozporządzenia Ministra Edukacji zmieniającego rozporządzenie w sprawie warunków i sposobu organizowania nauki religii w publicznych przedszkolach i szkołach (wersja z dnia 30 września 2024 r.)
Year: 2024
Type: article
Abstract: The subject of the opinion is a draft regulation of the Minister of Education providing for a reduction, from September 2025, of the number of religion lessons to one per week and imposing on school principals the obligation to place religion lessons before compulsory educational activities on a given day or after the end of these classes. In addition, the draft clarifies that the rules regarding the organization of religious education and ethics in an inter-unit or inter-class group will be applied in the case of organizing religious education or ethics in an inter-school group or at an extra-school catechetical point. These are proposals for further changes unfavourable for students attending religion and ethics classes - after the Ministry of National Education excluded the possibility of including grades in these subjects in the average and after regulations facilitating the creation of inter-class groups in which students of different years would learn religion or ethics in one class. The Ordo Iuris Institute has sent comments to the Ministry of National Education on the draft regulation of the Minister of Education amending the regulation on the conditions and method of organizing religious education in public kindergartens and schools in the version of September 30, 2024 (number in the list of legislative works of the Minister of Education - 38). The comments pointed out, among other things, that limiting the competences and freedom of the local school community in determining the weekly schedule of classes is inconsistent with the principle of subsidiarity resulting from the preamble to the Constitution of the Republic of Poland. The introduction in the form of a regulation of a restriction on the organization of religious education and ethics lessons, as referring to the constitutional right to education and the right to teach religion as a subject in school, is inconsistent with the requirements that the Constitution of the Republic of Poland places on law limiting human rights and freedoms. The obligation to organize religious education and ethics lessons before or after the end of compulsory educational activities on a given day raises justified doubts in terms of compliance with Article 12 paragraph 1 of the Concordat. Making it difficult to attend religious and ethics classes leads to a violation of the constitutional right to education, and in the case of religious classes – also the freedom of religion, manifested, among other things, in the freedom to teach it as a school subject. Such a situation also violates the right of parents to raise their children according to their own beliefs, including the sphere of moral and religious education and upbringing, and also leads to actual discrimination of students wishing to attend religious or ethics classes.
Source: The Legal Culture
Author: Łukasz Bernaciński
Language: English
Subfield: Education
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W4405949261