# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1956_S182
# Machine transcription, uncorrected — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

182 SEMINARIES AND COLLEGES

The Techniques of Recruitment

It is not necessary to spell out every conceivable technique
and method which might be employed in the vitally necessary
direct contact with persons who know about prospective recruits
and with the recruits themselves.

There is, however, room for much imagination in the develop-
ment of recruitment techniques particularly suited to the indi-
vidual congregation, for the use of synodical circuits, and for use
throughout synodical Districts.

Components of the individual congregation’s planned effort in
recruitment are motivation and inspiration for the service of
- the church, information about opportunities for training and for
service, publicity on training and service opportunities, direct
contact and interviews with students and their parents, cumula-
tive and purposeful guidance by pastors and teachers, and the
provision of incentives by the congregation, by Synod, or by
others.

There have been recent efforts toward a sustained and co-
ordinated attempt to get positive and emphatic publicity of all
sorts into Synod’s official and auxiliary church publications. It is
clear that the emphasis must be positive and must stress the
attractions of the church vocations as trained service to Christ and
to His church.

The President of Synod and his representatives gladly made
the church’s pressing need in this area a major presentation item
at each of the District conventions in 1955. Also in his public
statements and in special communications the President of Synod
called attention to the recruitment problem and urged help to its
speedy solution.

The synodical District Presidents have been invited to
add strong support for the synodical recruitment effort and to
take the leadership in developing special regional and District
efforts.

Your Board for Higher Education has been reluctant to issue
special mailings of posters, brochures, and folders from its office,
to make direct mailings to each of our pastors and teachers, but has
rather encouraged the synodical institutions to ‘develop special
programs in this regard for their own use. If this convention
reaches the conclusion that special benefits might accrue from
the development and use of general or special materials on re-
cruitment — to be prepared and distributed to the pastors,
teachers, and congregations of Synod — the Board for Higher
Education stands ready to undertake their preparation and
distribution.

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