LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 1973, Page 248

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248 HIGHER EDUCATION

Several other important facts need to be brought out. In the
first place, the crisis was not all that serious. Thanks to coura-
geous and imaginative district executives and placement officers
—and candidates—opportunities for service were eventually
found for practically all candidates who were reasonably free
and willing to accept positions in any part of the country.

Even more important, the entire experience now appears
to have been one of the most remarkable acts of blessing and
guidance by the church's Lord during the biennium. The entire
crisis, whether large or small, signalled one of the most impres-
sive breakthroughs in churchly life and ministry in many
decades. During the shortage, placement officers felt obligated to
place candidates in traditional ministries—in parishes that had
consistently supported the work of the church in people and
dollars and who now needed personnel, and in ministries that
promised some sort of ‘“success’’ in membership acquisitions.

But suddenly it was possible to assign, often on a very open,
cooperative, experimental basis, young workers to exciting
areas of opportunity which had long been crying unsuccessfully
for attention. Worker-priest ministries, team ministries, special-
ized ministries, shared ministries, ministries in public institu-
tions, in public education, in semi-public agencies, ministries
which allowed for a strong witness to the Gospel and a distinc-
tively Christian presence in distinctively nontraditional roles—
these now became possible. In fact, it is very likely that in some
instances what appeared at first simply to be expedient because
of a financial or personnel crisis actually turned out to be a move
we should have made as our first choice.

Because of the experimental nature of these ministries, a
somewhat higher “failure” rate should be expected. Some have
already ‘‘failed" and the persons involved are naturally some-
what unhappy. But these failures are often by traditional stan-
dards. They do not diminish the excitement which the Lord in-
jected into the church with His magnificent sense of timing.

The number of parishes using a director of Christian educa-
tion grew rapidly during the biennium ~ although fiscal problems
kept the rate of growth lower than predicted. A few failures
were experienced—usually attributed to the general lack of
understanding and experience with team ministries in our
Synod. But most responses by congregations, directors of Chris-
tian education, and pastors were enthusiastic. Many more of our
parishes need professional help in their educational programs.
Our colleges have some of the best experiences and best pro-
grams of any denomination in preparing directors of Christian
education. The opportunity for individual parishes or combina-
tions of parishes to secure such a competent person to meet
their needs is better today than at any other time in the last
20 years.

In the past, the leaders in many parishes and consolidated
schools have complained that so few synodically trained grad-
uates were available for their teaching staffs. Some of these
schools have been using the present availability of teacher
graduates from synodical schools to upgrade their faculties in
terms of academic and theological background. More schools
should be doing so.

—In Funding

How does the financial future look for synodical colleges?
The information available to the Board for Higher Education —
including the records of past financial performance by the
church, the needs and challenges faced by the Synod as seen by
its leaders, the potential income for Synod from the members
of the church, the studies and projections concerning the future
of our schools, and the opinions available from prominent men
in the American higher educational scene — all indicate that our
schools can move ahead, under God, and will have the funds
needed to do an even more effective job of providing workers for
the church, if rigorous and concerted efforts are made in at
least four areas involving finances.

One area, of course, is economy. As indicated in this report
earlier, some aspects of the recent belt tightening have been
good. And it will, without a doubt, be essential that our colleges
and seminaries continue to practice every possible economy
without limiting the objectives of the system. The board is hope-
ful that the proposed study of synodical higher education will
discover even additional ways to achieve more efficient opera-
tion, without any sacrifice of quality. The board still considers
the consolidation of some existing schools as a possible wise
move toward greater economy, and it intends to keep pursuing
this possibility with the schools and the boards of control.

The second area relates to subsidy. As was shown earlier
in this report, the percentages of income in all categories which
came from synodical subsidy dropped sharply again during the
past biennium. This trend must be remedied.

In looking at total needs for the system, the board considers
the following to be minimum goals for subsidy during the next
two years (for background information, see Figures 5, 6, and 7
given earlier): current income—38% of total: plant funds—a
return to approximately $10 per year per student; capital
income—50% of the total. Assuming that funds other than
subsidy and student fees can be increased sharply during the
next several years, the board sees the possibility that subsidy
might gradually be reduced by 1980 to an average of 35% of all
costs in all areas. However, evidence available at this time
indicates that any reduction beyond that level would seriously
jeopardize the efforts of the schools to fulfill the objectives
of the Synod.

The third area relates to student fees and student aid. Most of
the sharp reductions in the past biennium in the percentage of
operating costs being paid by synodical subsidy have been
absorbed through student fees, as seen in Figure 8. Almost all

FIGURE 8
PERCENT OF CURRENT INCOME WHICH CAME FROM
SYNODICAL SUBSIDY AND STUDENT FEES 1963-1972

Ne eee
ee ee
n a, o

Year 1963 1964 1965 1966 1967 1968 1969 sare Exal 1972

of the synodical schools indicate that the costs for the past year
for the average boarding student were well above $2,000. Stu-
dent fees have been rising at a rate three times as fast as the
overall economy. As can be seen in Figure 9, the average dollar
increase in tuition payments during the past biennium was as
great as the total for the preceeding 7 years combined. Addi-

FIGURE 9
AVERAGE TUITION PAYMENTS ° BY STUDENTS AT
SYNODICAL SCHOOLS 1963-1972

590
560
530

500

350
320
290

260