The importance of education in the development of future societies and the enrichment of the actual is something that is widely

considered to be one of the main goals in the advancing society we are developing over time and our main concern for the future, as said by Bill Gates in an interview on Morning Joe. Traditionally tied to education, religion has posed a major role on biasing its information, as we could recall Tomas de Aquino and his Scholasticism on implying Catholic beliefs on defending dogmas on medieval universities during the XIII century. When tying two concepts who at first seem to far apart but in the end it has become so natural to see them as a whole, the mistake of having faith based laws and to-follows, not based on facts but unproven beliefs, applied to what perhaps is the key to the success of a nation, education. As I believe, religion has its spot in society today, the same way any elective discipline has and applying it to education forces us, in a way, to follow and receive information from a source on which we may or maynot agree. In this particular context, agreeing or not is something that should be equally accepted and respected since one or another have no facts to support it. This spot religion poses in our society should by no means overlap the position where education stands in in order to look forward to develop self-thinkers and proactive human beings for our society. Religion itself has earned that position through the means of tradition and enforcement via time, lacking factual basis and therefore lacking the credibility and validity other disciplines like History or Mathematics tend to surpass easily and this being one of the reasons why power saw the need to enforce it instead of leaving it optional in the past, as we saw in medieval times in Europe, early colonial days in what now is the US or even in the present in some Middle Eastern Countries such as Saudi Arabia or Syria, which state religion and religious practice as an obligation rather than an option. In countries with such diversity like the US, religiousizing education guides into an inevitable problems in regards to multicultural awareness, especially to the students who dont share the same beliefs imposed by

the institution (Simon Schweber). Multicultural awareness and diversity are two key factors in a kids growing up process, as said by the author Robert Slaving in his book Educational Psychology. This lack of familiarity with diversity leads to imminent discrimination and as Kenneth Dion determined in his studies in 2002 on why majority-group members tended to discriminate minorities without taking into consideration how the victims felt about it. It was especially notorious the increase in hostility against Muslims wearing turbans or beards since the terrorist strike of 9/11. Leading from these thoughts and as Azam Kamguian wrote: Children have the right to be protected against the transgressions of religion and religious sects. This protection can only be established with a secular education where the right to decide freely and the right to learn from the most unbiased source possible prevail upon religious norms. This enters in conflict with the traditional belief of private/religious school offering a better education than public and laic institutions and parents wanting their kids to receive the best education possible. On the other hand as proven by William Jeynes in 2003 in regards to his study on religious beliefs tied to academic success he obtained a result that stated clearly that more religious-committed alumni tended to obtain better academic success as a result of a goal-setting mind set, in part, by their religious beliefs and religious motivation by families and religious staff like advisors or pastors. Religion certainly gives a certain amount of benefit on education like expanding our knowledge or having higher standards for our success but at the cost of punishing our society with higher ignorance and lack of knowledge on key points like diversity and tolerance, indispensable for a stable social environment. This balance issue is what I believe is key to understand and decide whether it is right or not to involve religion in education and its consequences.