Under the new national school chaplaincy funding model, each state has to decide how it distributes funds between the public, independent and Catholic school sectors.

In some states, such as Victoria and Western Australia, a quota system based on the ratio of different types of schools has been introduced. The system has seen cuts to funding for a number of state school chaplains.

In December, Anglican Archbishop of Perth, Roger Herft wrote a letter to West Australian church leaders calling on church-based schools to forgo applying for funding.

“I earnestly request the Christian-based independent sector to consider if we should be taking this funding, on the proviso that the funding is reallocated to the public sector,” he wrote.

While many chaplaincy providers are reluctant to speak out in support of Archbishop Herft in case they appear ungrateful for the funding they have received, many are disappointed some state schools are missing out.

Queensland is at the heart of the chaplaincy issue, with Queensland parent Ron Williams the force behind the High Court case challenge to the constitutionality of the previous funding model.

CEO of Scripture Union Queensland, Peter James agrees with Roger Herft that church schools should, if they can, free the funding up for state schools.

“If the church wants to say ‘let’s not take the money because that will mean more money is available for the government school sector’, then I applaud that, but that’s a matter for the church sector,” James told Eternity.

In NSW, the situation is slightly different. Grants have been distributed consistent with the past, but no new schools have received funding, meaning months of work by state school chaplaincy provider Generate to help new schools apply at first seemed to have gone to waste.

Generate Ministries ran a 6-8 month campaign to demonstrate the value of chaplaincy to state schools, encouraging them to decide to apply for a Chaplain. As a result, Generate received 630 expressions of interest from schools, and 435 of those confirmed they had applied for funding.

280 of these were new schools and all missed out on funding, while only schools already with a grant under the old program received grants for 2015.

“We’ve been well organised to work according to the Commonwealth guidelines and to find at the last minute all the new schools we’ve contacted wouldn’t be successful is a bit peculiar, and contrary to the guidelines,” says Peter Robinson, CEO of Generate.

The upside is that chaplains who were employed last year have retained their positions, and Peter is hopeful the new schools will still be keen to apply for a chaplain when the next NSW funding round for 2016-18 is announced later this year, with a level playing field.

“We’re hoping the work we’ve done has been a trial run for new schools, so that when we get to third term this year and the application process is rolled out for 2016-18 most of them will apply again, and in fact additional new schools will apply too.”