This article presents the authors' response to the article by Mark Pike, which appeared in the "Oxford Review of Education" in December 2010. Pike's article focuses on Trinity Academy, one of four academies in the Emmanuel Schools Foundation (ESF): it is not a faith school, but sponsored by a Christian faith-based and business-oriented organisation. Pike's stated aim is to evaluate "the specific nature of the Academy's ethos as it is "experienced" and interpreted by students and staff (not just as "intended" by leaders or sponsors)" (2010, p. 751). This intention is laudable, both because it rightly recognises that ethos is not simply a matter of explicit policy or public statements, and also because there is to date very little evidence about the day-to-day experiences of students and staff in these new privately sponsored schools. However, the authors have reservations about how far this aim was met. In this article, the authors argue that the data presented are insufficiently robust to support the assertions made, and there is a lack of rigour in using slippery terms such as "success", "excellence", and "transformation" without adequate definition. Pike's position is one of advocacy for the explicit incorporation of Christian values into publicly-funded education, yet this standpoint is (somewhat ironically) left implicit, with the result that potential bias is unacknowledged. (Contains 2 notes.)