Society: Ian Scott wrote to the rector of Hutchesons� Grammar School in Glasgow in April, asking to be able to opt out of the weekly assembly which he had been attending since first year.

Ian Scott wrote to the rector of Hutchesons' Grammar School in Glasgow in April, asking to be able to opt out of the weekly assembly which he had been attending since first year. Although he was raised a Christian - his mother is Catholic, his father Protestant - he told the school he was an atheist and felt he was having religion "forced" on him.

However the 16-year-old was told that he must continue to attend. Rector Dr Kenneth Greig cited various reasons, including the need for the whole school to gather as a community.

Scott doesn't accept this, given that Muslim and Jewish pupils in the school have their own meetings, as an alternative to the Christian gathering. However he does acknowledge that the position at Hutchesons' is better than in some schools - of two assemblies a week which he is required to attend, one is explicitly secular.

Independent schools are not bound by the guidelines given to state schools, which state that parents have the right to opt their children out of religious observance.

Scott is being supported by the Humanist Society of Scotland (HSS) and has been invited to talk at their conference on Sunday in Glasgow, which aims to highlight the rights of non-religious parents in state education.

The HSS points out that government guidance gives such parents clear rights in terms of objecting to faith-based input in assemblies - such as being taught to pray or sing hymns. They can also withdraw them from religious and moral education classes.

In guidance issued in 2005, schools are told parents should always be told they have such rights, and that their wishes should be respected. Pupils withdrawn from religious observance should be given a "worthwhile alternative activity" and "in no circumstances should a child be disadvantaged as a result of withdrawing from religious observance".

HSS says these provisions are regularly ignored and in some cases actively resisted. According to Ross Wright, of the HSS education committee, a "constant stream" of parents contact the society having tried and failed to withdraw their children from assemblies.

Others feel forced to back down for fear of stigmatising their children. He said: "We are in favour of gathering as a community, but not if it means you have to subscribe to a particular religion. We want to alert people to the fact that they have a legal right to demand an alternative and don't have to feel under pressure to go along with what is already there."

Wright has produced a guide for parents and senior pupils on recent legislation - over-16s like Ian Scott can choose to opt out themselves, if they are within the state education system. The HSS is inviting concerned parents to attend this week's meeting to meet other like-minded families, and get a complete picture of the current guidelines and practices. The event will also promote the Society's own materials offering non faith-based alternatives to religious observance.

Bob McKay, HSS convener and former education director at Perth and Kinross Council, said many schools were willing to observe the rights of parents to withdraw pupils, but were not putting anything in the place of assemblies for them. "Unfortunately the reality is that if children opt out they are often given uninspiring activities such as sitting with a book - even, in one case, a five-year-old who had not yet mastered the art of reading," he said.

"This is not an anti-religion campaign. We respect people's rights to their beliefs, however we also believe that right should be extended to those who do not have religious beliefs," he added.

A spokeswoman for Hutchesons' said the school was a multi-faith independent school offering a range of school assemblies, and was happy with the balance currently on offer.

The Convention of Scottish Local Authorities said the issue of religious observance was a matter for individual local authorities and often determined by individual schools.

Ewan Aitken, secretary of the Church of Scotland's Church and Society council argues that there is a value in gathering together for a sense of belonging, as well as learning about learning about the faith that motivates large numbers of people and shapes society. However he added that current guidelines made it clear school assemblies should not be primarily faith-based but should be about a "common search for values and belief in the broadest sense."

He thought it strange that the Humanist Society should object to that approach and said: "They seem to be cutting their noses off to spite their humanist faces."

Not surprisingly Wright disagrees. He said: "That isn't our experience. We are very happy for that kind of communal activity to happen and a shared ethos is great, if it is totally shared."

However he said parents and pupils were often put under pressure to conform or wrongly told they couldn't opt out.