Duke University Divinity School : 2007 Seminar
Narrative
FORMING PASTORS—FORMING TEACHERS
CONNECTING THE CLASSROOM TO THE CHURCH IN THE WORLD
DUKE UNIVERSITY DIVINITY SCHOOL
Duke University Divinity School is a university based theological school with a relationship to the United Methodist Church. This particular location at the intersection of academy and church encourages a variety of commitments alongside intellectual tasks, such as spiritual formation, worship as well as service in and to the world. These commitments work together to lend depth and purpose to the Divinity School’s identity and mission. However, the balance of such commitments can also lead to complexities for teaching and learning.
The Divinity School enjoys one of the youngest student bodies among ATS institutions, particularly its M.Div. candidates. Although this brings a number of benefits, it also presents challenges for forming pastors and other leaders for the church’s ministries. Early in the curriculum, core courses are taught as large lectures with weekly small groups led by doctoral students serving as preceptors. With the recent creation of the Th.D. program, we have a new cohort of students in residence. While not in every case, many of these students are returning to formal study after years away—years often spent working directly in the church’s ministries. We hope Th.D. students from their distinctive perspectives and experiences may help in continuing to address the multiplicity of pressures and issues that emerge related to theological formation of M.Div. students.
In the following dialogue, two faculty members teaching large first-year core courses and two doctoral students serving as preceptors begin to name challenges and opportunities. How might faculty, preceptors, and students participate in teaching and learning as individuals in community to form scholarly pastors and pastoral scholars for the academy and church in the world?
Dr. Wesley and Preceptor One meet weekly over lunch in the Divinity School Refectory to discuss the course and student progress. They find themselves in line with Dr. Harkness and Preceptor Two, meeting for a similar purpose. The four sit down for conversation together.
Dr. Wesley: How are you finding the new class of entering students?
Preceptor One: They are fine, a bit churchy, although one of my students wrote an exceptional paper—brilliant!—a straight A—esoteric and abstract. Many of the students seem very concerned with making A’s. I spend substantial time in conversation answering the question, “What can I do to make an A?”
Dr. Harkness: I’ve also noticed this preoccupation with grades. I’m concerned that students seem more worried about making an A than about learning the material and participating in formation. I’m also concerned that students seem not only to have less knowledge of biblical texts, but of life in a local church. Did part or all of the assignment to which you refer address the implications of Christian tradition for the contemporary church in the world?
Preceptor One: No. Students need first to learn critical thinking and writing skills.
Dr. Wesley: There seems a growing chasm between the students’ command of the material and its connection to Christian life in community. They are eager for the connection, but less able to navigate the complexities of history, such as race and gender, and the implications for contemporary life in communities of faith.
Preceptor Two: Yes, I just read a wonderful paper by a student on the cardinal virtues in Thomas’s Summa. When students take upper level classes in their second and third year, I am struck by how well they know “The Tradition.” But when I talk with them in their middler reviews or in the seminars and pose a contemporary theological issue, they struggle to come up with an answer. They can tell you what theologians said, but they have trouble appropriating theology and applying it to address theological and pastoral problems. Is it important that students begin to learn and practice this application in the first year?
Dr. Harkness: During office hours last week a student shared her anxieties with me. She feels there is a tremendous amount of pressure to do well at Duke. She is a very strong student and doesn’t have anything to worry about. But she said the external competition among students and the internal pressure she places upon herself are overwhelming. I reminded her that theological education is about more than making a grade. Ideally, it is a journey of transformation that allows students and faculty to engage in conversation across boundaries of difference together. Do we really need traditional grades to evaluate student learning?
Dr. Wesley: How can we encourage students to see the connections within the curriculum for ministry formation between coursework, field education, spiritual formation, worship, and service in and for the world?
Dr. Harkness: How does one encourage M.Div. students to learn the historical and biblical tradition, methods and narrative, while at the same time participating in formation as a person of faith called to serve the church in the world? How might doctoral students learn to teach in such an integrated way?
FORMING PASTORS—FORMING TEACHERS
CONNECTING THE CLASSROOM TO THE CHURCH IN THE WORLD
DUKE UNIVERSITY DIVINITY SCHOOL
Duke University Divinity School is a university based theological school with a relationship to the United Methodist Church. This particular location at the intersection of academy and church encourages a variety of commitments alongside intellectual tasks, such as spiritual formation, worship as well as service in and to the world. These commitments work together to lend depth and purpose to the Divinity School’s identity and mission. However, the balance of such commitments can also lead to complexities for teaching and learning.
The Divinity School enjoys one of the youngest student bodies among ATS institutions, particularly its M.Div. candidates. Although this brings a number of benefits, it also presents challenges for forming pastors and other leaders for the church’s ministries. Early in the curriculum, core courses are taught as large lectures with weekly small groups led by doctoral students serving as preceptors. With the recent creation of the Th.D. program, we have a new cohort of students in residence. While not in every case, many of these students are returning to formal study after years away—years often spent working directly in the church’s ministries. We hope Th.D. students from their distinctive perspectives and experiences may help in continuing to address the multiplicity of pressures and issues that emerge related to theological formation of M.Div. students.
In the following dialogue, two faculty members teaching large first-year core courses and two doctoral students serving as preceptors begin to name challenges and opportunities. How might faculty, preceptors, and students participate in teaching and learning as individuals in community to form scholarly pastors and pastoral scholars for the academy and church in the world?
Dr. Wesley and Preceptor One meet weekly over lunch in the Divinity School Refectory to discuss the course and student progress. They find themselves in line with Dr. Harkness and Preceptor Two, meeting for a similar purpose. The four sit down for conversation together.
Dr. Wesley: How are you finding the new class of entering students?
Preceptor One: They are fine, a bit churchy, although one of my students wrote an exceptional paper—brilliant!—a straight A—esoteric and abstract. Many of the students seem very concerned with making A’s. I spend substantial time in conversation answering the question, “What can I do to make an A?”
Dr. Harkness: I’ve also noticed this preoccupation with grades. I’m concerned that students seem more worried about making an A than about learning the material and participating in formation. I’m also concerned that students seem not only to have less knowledge of biblical texts, but of life in a local church. Did part or all of the assignment to which you refer address the implications of Christian tradition for the contemporary church in the world?
Preceptor One: No. Students need first to learn critical thinking and writing skills.
Dr. Wesley: There seems a growing chasm between the students’ command of the material and its connection to Christian life in community. They are eager for the connection, but less able to navigate the complexities of history, such as race and gender, and the implications for contemporary life in communities of faith.
Preceptor Two: Yes, I just read a wonderful paper by a student on the cardinal virtues in Thomas’s Summa. When students take upper level classes in their second and third year, I am struck by how well they know “The Tradition.” But when I talk with them in their middler reviews or in the seminars and pose a contemporary theological issue, they struggle to come up with an answer. They can tell you what theologians said, but they have trouble appropriating theology and applying it to address theological and pastoral problems. Is it important that students begin to learn and practice this application in the first year?
Dr. Harkness: During office hours last week a student shared her anxieties with me. She feels there is a tremendous amount of pressure to do well at Duke. She is a very strong student and doesn’t have anything to worry about. But she said the external competition among students and the internal pressure she places upon herself are overwhelming. I reminded her that theological education is about more than making a grade. Ideally, it is a journey of transformation that allows students and faculty to engage in conversation across boundaries of difference together. Do we really need traditional grades to evaluate student learning?
Dr. Wesley: How can we encourage students to see the connections within the curriculum for ministry formation between coursework, field education, spiritual formation, worship, and service in and for the world?
Dr. Harkness: How does one encourage M.Div. students to learn the historical and biblical tradition, methods and narrative, while at the same time participating in formation as a person of faith called to serve the church in the world? How might doctoral students learn to teach in such an integrated way?