Recently I had a day in an inner-London school supply-teaching Religious Education.
In the first lesson I was helping a regular teacher with a year 8 class. The teacher instructed the students that Muslim girls and women must wear headscarves and loose-fitting clothes.
I murmured to her that lots of Muslim girls and women do not wear headscarves, and some mainly-Muslim countries have laws against the headscarf. Of course, replied the teacher. But this is as much as the students need to know for Key Stage 3!
Actually, that particular school had lots of Muslim girls who didn’t wear headscarves, mostly of Kosovar, Turkish or Kurdish background.
The non-wearers showed no sign of being intimidated. For that matter, the teacher in question, though of South Asian and (to judge by her name) Muslim background, wore tight-fitting clothes and no headscarf.
But the question still stands: why is the state education system adding its weight to the most conservative parts of Muslim opinion (even if ineffectively, in this case)?
Another instructive part of a day was a lesson with year 9 students based on a worksheet provided by the regular teacher. The worksheet asked the students to discuss, among other questions: is it true that Islam describes Jews as "People of the Book"?
The students, all of majority-Muslim community background, divided into three groups.
A few devout and studious ones eagerly explained that, yes, Jews are People of the Book, and should be respected. Their imam had instructed them about that in their Quran classes.
A slightly larger group at the other end of the spectrum, generally girls of Kosovar, Turkish or Kurdish background not wearing headscarves, responded with a shrug. Who cares about this "People of the Book" mumbo-jumbo?
The majority, in the middle, were puzzled. "People of the Book" sounds good, no? Whatever the imams or the school textbooks say, they couldn't see how Jews could be "People of the Book".