Surveys among head teachers indicate that as many as 80 per cent are unwilling to conduct a formal act of worship.Now even the Archbishop of York is suggesting that daily religious observance should be abandoned lest perfunctory worship, conducted by teachers who do not themselves necessarily believe, turns children off religion. But ministers were also concerned that daily worship had been allowed to slip out of school assemblies, as creeping secularism and increasing numbers of pupils from non-Christian faiths had destroyed something in school life.
“It is because such an act of worship can perform an important function in binding together members of a school and helping to develop their sense of community that we make collective worship a statutory requirement,” said the government minister Baroness Hooper, when the measure was debated in the House of Lords.But since 1988 the decline has continued. The syllabus on religious education, which since 1944 had been the only compulsory subject in British schools, was to be stiffened. Kenneth Baker and his colleagues in Margaret Thatcher’s cabinet decided that the 1988 Education Reform Act – in addition to its introduction of opting out, making head teachers responsible for their own budg ets, and establishing the national curriculum – needed some spiritual underpinning. FOTHERGILL Director Outward Bound Trust Rugby Warwickshire 5 January. It seemed like a good idea at the time. If only we can be brought to realise this, we may never settle for anything less.”The whole point is that everyone is a winner.

It is the learning that is important, whether the task is successfully completed or not. Teamwork is people working together.The principle is personal and team development through a greater understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of the individual and others through a shared task experience. Competition destroys the Kurt Hahn principle.We don’t believe in denting the ego of losers because we don’t believe in a competitive focus. We believe in developing each individual participant and every participant is a winner.Yours faithfully, IAN L. Ibbetson and Newall’s research has an interesting, if self-evident, conclusion.

Unsurprisingly, winners had very positive reactions to the training while the losers had negative feelings about it.
Outward Bound corporate courses do not focus an inter-team competition because it negates the whole purpose of outdoor management development based on the ethos of Kurt Hahn, the father of the experiential learning philosophy and the co-founder of Outward Bound.”We are all better than we know. When accompanied by government lies, the price is especially heavy.Yours sincerely, MAUREEN TOLFREE Bristol 4 January Brian Peters was killed while serving as a cameraman for HSV7, Sydney.. From Mr Ian Fothergill Sir: Barrie Clement’s article, “Adventure courses `dent egos’” (4 January) reports on the research findings of Adrian Ibbetson and Sue Newall on the psychological effects of competitive Adventure-Based, Experimental Learning courses. We know now that if any of the five had emerged alive, with one of the final films, Indonesia’s full-scale invasion would have been cancelled. We know now that the British and Australian governments knew about Balibo but stayed silent.

Had they protested, full-scale invasion – and its ghastly aftermath – would not have occurred. We know, too, that a sixth journalist was murdered in East Timor soon after the full-scale invasion He was Roger East. One reason why he was in East Timor was to investigate the Balibo killings.
Dr Eyal suggests that the media are being taught their responsibilities through journalists’ deaths Their families pay part of the price. I was one such – until October 1975, when Brian Peters and his four colleagues died at Balibo, East Timor Accidental death in civil war Or so we were told Brian was my brother

We know, now, that Indonesian troops were involved. From Mrs Maureen Tolfree Sir: The journalistic death toll highlighted by Jonathan Eyal will shock all who took news for granted (“Some journalists are dying for a good story”, 3 January). But a strong young man on a job-share arrangement would be very welcome and I’m open to offers.
Yours faithfully, SUSAN HINDS Windsor, Berkshire 6 January. A 57-year-old woman (me) winds our church and town clock twice a week and my predecessor continued to go up the tower occasionally until a few months before his death at the age of 89

Up the wrinklies and crumblies, I say.