Religious Education SKE

Our online Religious Education SKE is a flexible course that allows you to address any gaps in your knowledge of the six major world religions, philosophy and ethics and how all this fits in with the curriculum in secondary schools.

Study a Religous Educaton SKE at Sussex

We offer a tailored eight-week course covering a range of units for trainees including GCSE and A Level and the general teaching of RE. All units are supported by a personal tutor and an excellent range of resources including Open Learn, Culham St Gabriel’s and the Oak Academy. You can refer to the resources whenever you need them in your training year – even after your SKE is complete.

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Typical course structure

The Sussex online Religious Education SKE is an eight-week course, built on two four-week units, which can be studied flexibly. Examples of the topics within the two units include:

Buddhism, Hinduism, Christianity, Sikhism, Judaism and Sikhism (GCSE level)
Philosophy, Ethics and Christianity (A level)
Digging Deeper into Religion and Curriculum (GCSE and A Level)
Philosophy and Religion in the modern world

Application deadlines

Our SKE courses have different deadlines depending on the length of the course you’re applying to.

See our application page for more information.

Eligibility and funding

SKE courses are funded by the Department for Education (DfE) if you have been offered a place on a PGCE course with enrolment on an SKE course as a condition of accepteance.

Find out more about SKE eligibility and funding.

Self-funded SKEs

We also offer a self-funded SKE route for:

teacher trainees who are not eligible for DfE funding
qualified teachers who want to teach a new subject, or refresh their subject knowledge before returning to teaching after a break
anyone considering teaching as a new career who wants to increase their subject knowledge before applying for teacher training.

Rather than four-week units, self-funded SKEs are based on blocks of 100 hours of study. You can choose which units you want to study and add additional units as you progress.

The cost is £800 for one 100 hour unit, and £500 for each additional unit. Fees can be paid by you or, if relevant, by your school/institution (schools within the Sussex Partnership or PGCE Pedagogy and Practice Partnership can apply for partnership rates).

If you have any questions about self-funding your SKE, email ske@sussex.ac.uk.

Resources

In addition to input from specialist subject tutors you will also receive:

GCSE and A Level textbooks for Religious Studies with AQA.
access to a range of RE resources, including projects and units of work from RE Online.
a fully paid subscription to ExamPro, a database of past KS3, GCSE and A-level exam questions
access to thousands of relevant physical and e-books through our Library
licensed software such as Microsoft Office and Adobe Acrobat Pro
access to Box of Broadcasts, a huge collection of documentaries, schools TV, films and drama that you can stream for free.