Leadership & Faculty

Dr. Ben Merkle is the president of New Saint Andrews College, as well as a Fellow of Theology. He holds a D.Phil. in Oriental Studies and an M.St. in Jewish Studies from Oxford University, England; an M.A. degree in English Literature, a Greyfriars Letter, and a B.S. in Education (Secondary Education-Chemistry, with a minor in History) both from the University of Idaho.

He is a teaching elder Christ Church, Moscow, regularly preaching at their downtown service. Dr. Merkle is the author of The White Horse King (Thomas Nelson Publishers, 2009) and Defending the Trinity in the Reformed Palatinate (Oxford University Press 2015). He and wife Rebekah have five children.

Dr. Timothy Harmon is the Provost and a Fellow of Theology. He has taught Freshman Theology, Reformed Systematics, and electives in systematic and historical theology. Dr. Harmon joined the College faculty in 2019. He completed his M.A. (2014) and Th.M. (2015) at Western Seminary, and his Ph.D. (2019) at the University of Aberdeen, writing on the doctrine of biblical inspiration. Prior to joining the College’s faculty, he served in pastoral ministry and as a theological and biblical studies instructor at Western Seminary.

He lives with his wife Shelley and their children in Moscow.

Accounting and finances are overseen by Andy Trauger, Chief Financial Officer, who earned his BBA in Accounting from Texas A&M University-Texarkana. He worked in a variety of manufacturing industries (Georgia-Pacific, Stemco, Sweet Shop USA, and Nestle Waters), with increasing responsibility for cost analysis, capital management, and improvements to operational efficiency.  For the last several years before coming to NSA, he was a factory controller with full responsibility for the financial operations of the facility, including the management of multiple audits, Sarbanes-Oxley, ISO 9001, and TS16949 quality standards.

He lives with his wife Heather in Moscow.

Brenda Schlect, the Chief Administrative Officer, holds an MS from the University of Idaho. She has served New Saint Andrews College since 1996 and has extensive experience at NSA in a variety of roles such as Director of Admissions, Director of Recruitment, Bursar, and Administrative Secretary to the Board of Trustees. She organizes regular staff meetings, prepares the weekly administrative dashboard, manages the college schedule, keeps all non-academic records, and provides a wealth of experience, perspective, and institutional memory.

Jean Brainerd, the Director of Assessment and Institutional Effectiveness holds a BS in Business Administration from the University of Texas, and was a CPA at Price Waterhouse and Rockwell International.  At NSA she serves as the liaison to accreditors, analyzes assessment results and documents actions taken in the annual Assessment Plan, develops and uses institutional research to improve effectiveness, and coordinates procedural updates to keep all guidance clear, concise, and concordant.