Commenting on Education Secretary Michael Gove’s plans to place former services personnel in schools and promote a military ethos, Simon Barrow, co-director of the religion and society thinktank Ekklesia, which works with peacemaking churches and organisations, said:
“Attempts to militarise education and other aspects of public life are a disturbing trend.
“The skills and aptitudes young people need most in a changing, diverse and conflictual world are those that foster cooperation, creative nonviolence, conflict transformation, restorative justice, peacemaking, and a sense of moral community that eschews rather than glorifies violence.
“The £2 million the government is planning to spend on this initiative could instead be directed fruitfully to involving in education and school learning the numerous NGOs working in these conflict-challenging fields.”