# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1947_S166
# Machine transcription, uncorrected — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

166 SEMINARIES AND COLLEGES

Obviously, the functional position of a teacher cannot be
determined by mere speculation; it must be determined entirely
by a close analysis of the needs of the student. Knowledge of
subject matter is only one of these needs. There are other needs
at least as important. Moreover, the student quickly forgets much,
if not most, of his knowledge. While knowledge certainly is not
to be eschewed or disdained, its transitory nature, except under
certain conditions which cannot ordinarily be provided, certainly
must be frankly recognized. Thus it is that a teacher should always
in some degree, and in many fields in great degree, manipulate his
subject matter consciously toward definite ends other than merely
“knowledge.”

Unfortunately, the usual tenor of a call to a professorship in
Synod’s schools encourages a view of teaching functions which,
it must be said, severely limits its scope. A professor is called
to teach a subject. Properly, it would seem, he should be called
to the work of attempting to produce in students certain effects —
a portion of the enumerated objectives — partly through the instru-
mentality of certain subjects. And, it would seem, the selection
of the candidate for a professorship should be based on that view
of his function.

The foregoing observations suggest that if the teacher in a
synodical school for the training of ministers is to apply his efforts
effectively toward the achievement of the institutional objectives,
a number of conditions should be met:

a. Every teacher must recognize

(1) That he is not primarily a purveyor of information, but
that he is an active, vital agent of the total conditioning
program of the school actively sharing the responsibility
for the achievement of all the objectives of the school.

(2) That each course must make certain definite contribu-
tions toward the achievement of school objectives; that
these course-purposes must be clearly identified; that
these course-purposes must never be confined simply to
“knowledge” and, indeed, may be almost completely
outside the meaning of the term “knowledge”; that
every course must be treated in a manner appropriate
for its particular purposes; and that all of these course-
purposes must converge on a single ultimate goal: teach-
ing the student how, under the motivation of gratitude
to God for the atonement of Christ, he may do the will
of God.

(3) That he, the teacher, cannot escape, whether in the class-
room or out of it, a considerable pastoral responsibility
toward his students.