On behalf of all of us in the New Saint Andrews College community, I'd like to wish you a glorious Advent, Christmas and New Year!

God bless you as we celebrate the incarnation of the Lord Jesus Christ, our Messiah and Immanuel. And may the King of Kings give you a healthy, prosperous, and fruitful Year of Our Lord 2010.

James Smith's provocative new book, Desiring the Kingdom (Baker, 2009), challenges higher education as usual. As he notes, "The university can't help but be a formative institution because of the powerful (though often unofficial) liturgies that shape our identity and self-understanding" (pp. 112-113). That is why, he points out, many if not most of our most overtly secular and atheistic state universities feature stunning pieces of intentionally Gothic academic architecture. Such structures acknowledge (however unintentionally) the inescapably liturgical and religious character of higher education. No self-respecting Pagan U would be without its Cathedral of Learning, as Smith calls it.

Smith's point is important for every Christian parent to grasp. Higher education is not just a neutral data dump into a child's head. It is not just a place to get spiritually indifferent job or career training. Colleges and universities are life-shaping, vision-forming, habit-making, worship-lifting sanctuaries. Colleges and universities are places of worship. That's why they are the high ground in today's cultural warfare. They are one of the key places where the next generation will learn to worship the living God or the deaf and dumb idols of our age. And the impression that worship leaves is indelible.

No matter how much financial "aid" a college may throw at our children, now matter how highly ranked a particular vocational program might be, no matter how close to home the college might be, the central question remains: In which Cathedral of Learning will your children worship?

Colleges today have become little more than academic cruise ships in dry dock. The typical college experience now includes non-stop entertainment, the latest recreation facilities, health care services, fitness centers, weekly sports spectacles, deluxe accommodations, and first-class food service.

But wait, there’s more: Some colleges even provide personal counseling sessions, bonus excursions (field trips), and . . . can you believe it? . . . classes for academic credit!

If you figure the average 7-day cruise to Mexico or the Caribbean costs about $1,200 per person, then a 32-week cruise (the length of the average academic year) would be $38,400. That’s about the same price as the average private college tuition plus room and board these days. Unfortunately, it comes without views of Mexico or the Caribbean out your dorm-cabin window.

If you can’t afford this luxury academic-cruise-ship-in-dry-dock experience, don’t worry. There’s always lots of other people’s tax dollars available to pay for your academic cruising pleasure.

No wonder college tuition has skyrocketed and taxpayers have that sinking feeling. Our state and federal leaders and captains of many private colleges are willing to go down with that ship. And college reforms are often little more than rearranging the chairs on the Titanic.

At New Saint Andrews, we'd prefer to offer you a rigorous higher education at its real cost. You'll still have enough tuition savings left over -- compared to the typical cruise-ship-in-dry-dock college -- to spend several weeks cruising the real Mexico or Caribbean. If you're into that sort of thing.

New Saint Andrews follows the great classical Christian liberal arts tradition that thrived for centuries prior to the specialization revolution in the late 19th century. A growing number of scholars acknowledge that the classical Christian college approach did not decline on its own as much as it was intentionally suppressed by secularists, pragmatist, and socialists who were backed by government authority and taxpayer's money. One of the great corrosive intellectual developments in the late 19th and early 20th centuries was to fragment college-level learning into "disciplinary specialization."

Authors Jon Roberts and James Turner made this case at a conference celebrating Princeton's 250th anniversary. Below are selected quotes from their book, The Sacred and Secular University (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2000), which grew out of that conference.
(Bold emphases added)

“Professors in this era [pre-mid-19th century] did not teach specialized courses (what we would think of as ‘upper-level’ courses), nor did students ‘major’ in a ‘discipline.’ Either would have breached the conception of college work.” (p. 84)

“For the classical college did not wish to equip one student differently from another. Rather, it intended to discipline each student’s mental faculties through the same general studies and to furnish every brain with the same broad smattering of information. College study thereby laid a basis for more advanced learning—though perhaps some superstructure actually rose on the foundation more often in the president’s dreams than in the graduates’ lives.” (p. 84)

“Even when postgraduate study in the arts and sciences first glimmered—as feebly it did at Harvard in the 1830s and Michigan in the 1850s—it offered more extensive culture, not training for specialized research. And the first college to experiment seriously with electives—Harvard in the 1840s—aimed to enliven general education, not to create a more specialized one.” (p. 84)

“Mere specialization had earlier implied only mastery of a particular subject. It neither limited authority over that subject to a distinctive cadre of methodologically acculturated experts nor restricted a scholar from pursuing very different subjects. Charles Norton had indisputable claim to specialized expertise in several fields—but in no ‘discipline.’ The novelty of disciplinary specialization is obscured by the fact that discipline, like humanity, is an old academic term that acquired a new meaning after 1850. But novel it was.” (p. 86)

“The decisive distinction of the new specialization, separating it from older forms of specialization, was not narrowness of range but acknowledgment of disciplinary isolation. . . . It declared that, in principle, scholarly competence required restricting oneself to one’s ‘discipline.’” (p. 86)

“Disciplinary specialists thus began to snip apart the previously undivided map of knowledge into separate territories. Between these ‘disciplines’ they started to erect methodological fences hard for nonspecialists to scale. They declared, though still uncertainly and confusedly, two revolutionary dogmata: that knowledge does not form a whole but, on the contrary, properly divides itself into distinct compartments, and that unique methodological principles and scholarly traditions govern life within each of these boxes.” (pp. 86-87)

“This emerging urge to repudiate the unity of knowledge both prefigured the more radical antifoundationalism of the next fin de siecle and mirrored the nineteenth century’s larger flight from universalism, seen in such movements as racism and nationalism; what connections subsist amongst these phenomena, if any, merits reflection.” (p. 87)

“Yet it would be utterly wrong to claim disciplinary specialization as epistemologically dominant in the late nineteenth century; on the contrary it was no more than a babbling infant.” (p. 87)

“This new specialization, differing from older expertise in the degree to which it fragmented knowledge in the United States during the twentieth century. . . . The term disciplinary specialization, then, serves here as a kind of ideal type: a convenient shorthand to label these tendencies toward fragmented, disciplinary knowledge—inclinations often alluded to in the 1880s and 1890s.” (p. 87)

“The hotbed of specialization after 1870 was the handful of research-oriented universities; smaller colleges usually had little inclination for it and less space. And even many practicing specialists remained convinced in theory of the ultimate unity of knowledge, however poorly their faith comported with the realities of their research. So any notion that this new ideal developed with consistency in the decades after 1850 is absurd. That it impinged much on the consciousness of the average professor is unlikely.” (pp. 87-88)

The beginning of the 21st century is a . Theological debates have broadened and intensified. Calls for educational reform at every level are everywhere. So the need for graduate programs in theology and classical Christian studies to equip students for such a time has never been greater.

Trinitarian Theology & Culture
Theology today is at a turning point. While some theologians continue to abandon orthodoxy, others in “mainline” churches are turning back toward historic orthodoxy. Theological conversations across the boundaries between Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, and Protestants are more sustained and fruitful than they have been since the Reformation. And the churches of the Southern Hemisphere have begun to re-teach the North what it means to be Christian, as mission fields now produce fields of missionaries. In such a dynamic setting, advanced theological study must be as catholic as the church herself and remain steadfast in our commitment to the primacy, authority, and truth of Scripture. Conservative theologians and students of theology today have a double responsibility. We must fully participate in the debates taking place within theology, and enter them recognizing that theology will always be a battleground. The College’s two-year resident Master’s Program in Trinitarian Theology & Culture offers advanced theological education to equip the next generation of theologians and theologically informed leaders in other fields for this double responsibility.

Classical Christian Studies
The classroom too has been one of the major battlegrounds in the recent culture wars. The sharp intellectual and spiritual decline of America’s schools over the past several decades awakened many from their educational slumbers and encouraged Christians to reexamine their assumptions about the education of their covenant children. The search for alternative educational models led to the rediscovery of the church’s rich academic heritage and the classical tradition. This, in turn, launched the home schooling and classical Christian school movements. Despite sometimes hostile opposition from the government-school cartel, home and classical Christian education have enjoyed stunning growth and unrivaled success. Sustaining these reforms in curriculum, pedagogy, and vision over time hinges, in large part, on raising up the next generation of classically educated Christian educators. If the academic high ground—post-secondary education—remains in the hands of those opposed to home schooling and classical Christian education, then the hard-won educational reforms will be short-lived indeed. The College’s Classical Christian Studies programs have been developed to meet the challenge of advancing and sustaining these educational reforms for future generations. The program’s limited-enrollment and low-residency options allow working educators, home schooling parents, and aspiring scholars to broaden their understanding of the classical Christian educational paradigm from a distinctively Trinitarian perspective. Its modular design allows working students flexibility in course selection and scheduling.

An Invitation
The graduate faculty invites you to join us in the pursuit of all things Trinitarian and classical for this remarkable moment in history. Contact the Graduate Admissions office for more about these strategic programs.

Selecting a college need not be perilous. But if college is in your son or daughter’s future, you’ll need to study up to keep your student’s Christian worldview on course.  Here’s a checklist for the discerning Christian parent to use when comparing colleges…

1. Since students become like their teacher, do I know (not just hope) the college’s professors are worthy of imitation?

2.  Will my student’s Christian worldview be encouraged and strengthened?

3.  Do the students at the college take their faith and studies seriously?

4.  Are students encouraged to live in the community as responsible adults?

5.  Since where my student worships each Lord’s Day is as important as where he studies, are there faithful churches close by?

6.  Does the college’s curriculum provide for a lifetime of faithful living?

7.  Does the college refuse government aid to remain free from the pressures of political correctness and liberal ideology? 

8.  Does the college limit class size and enrollment to assure the highest level of faculty-student interaction?

9.  Will I pay less than half the average private college tuition and have the option of locking in the same tuition rate for four years?

10. Is the college accredited by a nationally recognized Christian accreditation organization that upholds the Christian mission of the college?

As you visit various campuses with your college-bound student in his or her college selection process, please include us on your short list of schools.  We’d love the opportunity to tell you about our time-honored classical Christian liberal arts education, and why at New Saint Andrews the answer is yes…to all the above.

In an age when college choice often boils down to majors and money, the words of Jesus should awaken all college-bound Christians and their families from their academic slumbers: “A student, when he is mature, will be like his teacher” (Luke 6:40). Contrary to the dominant collegiate mythology, majors and career choices come and go. Grand halls and ivied walls make no promises. High rankings and venerable traditions guarantee nothing. The most important question Christians must ask when considering college, according to Jesus, is, “Who will be my teachers?”

Our Professors are the College
New Saint Andrews believes that its professors are the College. That ’s true of our graduate programs as well as our undergraduate level. Because our teachers are the ones who will shape the hearts, minds, and lives of our students, nothing is more important than ensuring the unimpeachable character and quality of our professors. We limit enrollment because we limit the size of our faculty. Genuine accountability means, at minimum, that I, as the College’s president, must be able to say before God and our students that I know my colleagues, their spouses and children, their character and manner of life. I know their dedication to Christ, their passion for teaching, and their love of wisdom, beauty, and virtue–and most importantly, their students. To be able to say that honestly, the faculty must be of a size that I can know personally and deeply. And knowing them that well, allows me to evaluate accurately their academic excellence, spiritual faithfulness, and personal integrity. And I can honestly say that I want my own children and grandchildren, when mature, to be like these teachers. True education is never impersonal. New Saint Andrews students don’t just study theology, but Peter Leithart. They don’t just take biology, but Gordon Wilson. They don’t just learn Greek, but John Schwandt. And it’s not just about what they say or do in the classroom, but it’s seeing up-close and personally how they nurture their spouses and children, how they worship God and love their neighbors, how they see the world with Trinitarian eyes, and how they model Christ in every thing they do every day. Everything else is secondary or dross.

Learning to be Truly Human
The relationship between teacher and student is important biblically speaking because it is one of the glorious ways we reflect the Triune character of our Creator. The joyful, ceaselessly creative unity-in-diversity of the Father, S on and Holy Spirit is not only reflected in creation and revealed in the mutual love and sacrifice found in the church and marriage (Eph. 5), but also in the nurturing of our children (Eph. 6:4). The ways we rear our children, including how we educate them, are actions done as unto the Lord Himself. As Jesus said, “Truly, …as you did to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me” (Matt. 2 5:40). God’s covenant offspring, our children, are precious because “to such belong the kingdom of heaven” (Matt. 19:14 ). From the first universities in the Middle Ages, Christian higher education’s primary purpose has been largely the same as education in the younger years: to carefully guide the next generation, our students, through the paideia of the Lord to Christian maturity and adulthood by illuminating  God’s Triune character through H is works of truth, beauty, and goodness across the ages. Educators did not train their students merely to do tasks, but educated them to be someone: a man or woman of unimpeachable Christian character equipped for every good work (Eph. 2 :10), prepared in the art of living well “before the Lord in His inhabited world” (Prov. 8). Higher education, then, like all teaching, is not a “data dump” from one brain to another or a transfer of job skills from one worker to the next. Rather, it is an enculturation into what it means to be truly human. To study in the classical Christian liberal arts tradition is to rediscover our cultural heritage, to hear anew the historical, philosophical, theological, scientific and poetic voices that, in God’s kind providence, framed the great conversations and imaginative worlds explored throughout the ages we are now privileged to join.

An Invitation
“A student, when he is mature, will be like his teacher.” Jesus’s words clash with the many impersonal approaches in higher education today. But they resonate well with the personal pedagogy of the classical Christian tradition followed at New Saint Andrews. Our College is our teachers and we are dedicated to nurturing our students’ souls, intellects and imaginations in the endless Trinitarian adventure. Come join us on this remarkable personal journey.

• “New Saint Andrews immerses students in the great works of Western civilization, as viewed through the distinctive lens of Calvinist theology.”

• “New Saint Andrews places a high value on integration, whether that integration is between the Christian and classical traditions, within interdisciplinary classes, or between the academic world and daily life.”

• “Classes are taught in the tutorial style, and professors have the opportunity to know their students as individuals.”

• “Both faculty and students see the school’s size and sense of community as an asset, with graduates often recalling this as one of the school’s best features.”

But don’t take their word for it, come see us for yourself!