# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1947_S828
# Machine transcription, uncorrected — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

826 YOUNG PEOPLE’S WORK

greater than during the past few years. In 1946, exclusive of Camp
Arcadia, Walther League districts sponsored fifty-two weeks of
camping. Three Walther League districts now have camps which
they own, and several others are taking steps to purchase a camp
site in co-operation with other agencies of the Church. One
synodical District has bought a camp. The increased demand for
a summer-camp program for the youth of the Church is a signifi-
cant development in the work of the League. The possibilities of
this development and its need for careful direction have never been
more evident than during the past three years.

As a part of its Golden Anniversary celebration in 1943, the
Walther League determined upon a program of special training in
the youth work of the Church. At the request of the Board for
Young People’s Work, the Board of Directors granted permission
to ask an offering for this purpose from the congregations of Synod.
This offering of approximately $23,000 constituted the Lutheran
Youth Fund, which supported the program known as the Lutheran
Service Volunteer Schools, developed and conducted by the Board
for Young People’s Work and the Walther League. Since 1944,
thirty of these schools have been held during the summer for a
period of one week in all parts of the United States and Canada,
with a total attendance of more than 2,000 young people. Nineteen
schools are scheduled for this summer. The training which these
L.S.V. Schools give in the understanding and use of the principles
and methods which must be basic in the development of effective
youth work in the Church is enthusiastically acclaimed by the
young people who attend as well as by the pastors who are ac-
quainted with the program or have had some of their young people
in attendance. The Atlantic District of Synod this past winter
sponsored L.S.V. School institutes in one zone of each of the
four Walther League districts within its jurisdiction in an effort
to test the possibility of making this training more generally avail-
able by setting aside two hours each night of one week in order
to have the young people become acquainted with the L.S.V.
School program and methods. Although the results possible under
this arrangement are obviously not comparable with what is
achieved at a regular L.S. V. School, the expansion of the L.S. V.
School institutes offers opportunities to win understanding and
support for the L.S.V. Schools, which merit further study and
experimentation. The L.S.V. Schools are without doubt one of
the most far-reaching training programs ever undertaken in the
youth work of our Church.

Another notable undertaking of the Walther League during
the past three years is the inauguration of the Wheat Ridge Foun-
dation. This Foundation is established to direct the development