Susan See, Tod and Jake, Sarah Flynn - Baulkham Hills Primary

5,500 Children Now in Ethics Classes

The NSW Education Act 1990 was amended on December 1, 2010, giving students who don’t attend Special Religious Education (SRE) / Scripture classes in NSW public schools the legal right to attend philosophical ethics classes as an option to supervised ‘private study'.

St James Ethics Centre established Primary Ethics in late 2010. Since then, Primary Ethics has been working hard to provide as many ethics classes in as many public primary schools as possible. The first classes started in Term 1, 2011. We continue to roll out classes in a responsive and orderly fashion, not allowing haste to compromise the quality of our recruitment, training and support of our volunteer Ethics Teachers and Coordinators. Quality delivery of a quality curriculum remains our imperative.

We have created a curriculum framework that spans Kindergarten to Year 6 and are busy writing individual lessons to populate that framework. Approximately 5,500 children from Years 3-6 attend our ethics classes each week.  We will roll out classes to younger primary school children over the course of the next two years.

What you can do

Volunteer as an Ethics Teacher in your local school: Are you interested in helping young people to think about ethics? Can you commit time to attend training and to teach a weekly class for at least one full year?

Volunteer as an Ethics Coordinator for your school community: We need well-organised people to liaise with school principals, volunteer ethics teachers, the wider school community and Primary Ethics to ensure ethics classes have a smooth introduction into every school.

Other volunteering opportunities: Primary Ethics needs volunteers with particular skills and expertise - and the time - to help us get the organisation operating efficiently in a short period of time. Can you help?

Become a Supporter: Register your support for Primary Ethics and stay in touch with what is happening as the program develops over time.

Sponsorship: Many generous organisations have donated goods and services to Primary Ethics. See who they are and see a list of what else we need.

Sign up your school for Philosophical Ethics classes: Find out the steps you need to take to start classes at your school.