Excerpt:
As children start the new school year, the secular canton of Geneva has issued guidelines for teachers on how to deal with religious issues in the classroom.
The 30-page booklet, entitled 'Secularism at school', aims to address questions such as whether students may pray at school, wear religious symbols or be exempted from certain activities such as swimming classes.
Issued by Geneva's department for education, culture and sport (DIP), the guide, which is illustrated with cartoons, stresses the canton's guiding principle of secularism and religious neutrality "in the context of great sensitivity surrounding religious questions," the DIP said in a statement.