Non-Western Missionaries and International Christian Schools
Dale Linton, MA, serves as assistant professor of education at Spring Arbor University in Spring Arbor, Michigan. Before taking his current position, he taught at Bingham Academy in Ethiopia and served as the social studies department head and curriculum coordinator at Rift Valley Academy in Kenya.
You can’t do Bible translation without missionary families. If the children’s education needs aren’t being met, the families aren’t going to stay in the field. The missionaries have enough challenges. If we can increase the capacity of the school,we will increase the number of translators and linguistic experts who are mobilizing nationals to complete the task. Expanding the school is a critical need to keep families on the field.
—Bob Pittman, International Children’s Education Coordinator, SIL International
Anyone who has been directly involved in overseas missions in the past twenty years can attest to the rapidly changing demographics of those who are carrying out the mandate of the Great Commission. The missionaries from the West—North America, Western Europe, and lands “down under”—have been joined and in some areas replaced by a growing non-Western missionary force. Many nations once viewed as “receiving nations” for missionaries are today identified as “sending nations.” This reshaping was first felt as the Korean church began to send increasing numbers of missionaries around the world. Today, it is not uncommon to find Western missionaries working side by side with non-Western missionaries from Africa, Asia, and Latin America. The shift is dramatic and exciting as national churches planted in earlier missionary endeavors mature and take on the role of fulfilling Christ’s Great Commission.
However, as is the case with all dramatic change, this shift is not without its own unique problems and concerns. A major concern that has caught the attention of some mission leaders is the challenge of planning, providing, and sustaining viable educational options for the children of these new sending nations. Already, we are hearing alarming stories of missionary attrition from these countries. In many instances entire families have returned from important fields because they are unable to meet the educational needs of their children. Our new missionary brothers and sisters are facing what the Western missionary agencies learned early in their history—providing a means of education for the children of missionaries is vital to maintaining the longevity of those sent out. Unfortunately, these new sending countries, agencies, and churches are often too severely limited in their resources to do what the Western missions did—build schools and supply them with missionary teachers and support personnel. In fact, those within the established missionary education community will quickly admit that even for Western missions, recruiting and maintaining a viable teaching and educational support staff has been increasingly difficult. If Western missions, with far greater resources, face difficulties in educating MKs (missionary kids), the challenges facing non-Western missionary families must seem daunting, even impossible.
Concern for these new missionaries and the education of their children was the central focus of a meeting in November 2004 at the headquarters of OC International in Colorado Springs. Phil Renicks, vice president of international ministries for the Association of Christian Schools International (ACSI), and a group of concerned missionary educators gathered to discuss the growing concern for non-Western missionary families and the educational options available to their children. The group said in its minutes that the West cannot solve the problem of educating the children of missionaries from Asia, Latin America, and Africa. What it can do is help our non-Western colleagues find solutions. It was the belief of the participants that international Christian schools and organizations like ACSI are in a position to become partners in developing viable and reasonable solutions for these new missionaries. Our years of trial and error, our comparatively vast resources, and our desire to be a part of this exciting new missionary movement put us in a position to be solution seekers with our non-Western brothers and sisters.
However, it was determined that, before we join these non-Western missionaries as solution seekers, we need to research the actual educational situation and the related family issues they face. Therefore, this past March at the U.S. Center for World Missions, a second meeting was held wherein some agencies working in Latin America and the Philippines presented reports on their educational and family needs. The information was overwhelming, even heartbreaking, and at times it was difficult to fathom the current and projected situations in all their complexity.
In the 1980s, Nepal was still a staunch Hindu kingdom with only a small persecuted church.Today there are hundreds of thousands of believers, and churches have been started within each of the more than a hundred distinct people groups.
Bob Pittman (SIL International) reported that information he’s compiled indicates that there are currently 16 thousand Korean missionaries worldwide, with more than 40 thousand Christian churches in that one country. Thus the potential for the Korean church to continue expanding as a missionary sending force is a given. Furthermore, Chinese Christian leaders have indicated their desire to send more than 100 thousand missionaries in the future. In addition, the Filipino church has stated a goal of sending out 200 thousand missionaries! COMIBAM, an umbrella organization for Latin American mission agencies, reports that 7 thousand Latin American missionaries, 3 thousand of whom are Brazilian, are currently serving outside their countries. It was further acknowledged that certain nations in Africa—notably Nigeria, Ethiopia, and Côte d’Ivoire—have been identified as significant sending countries.
Needless to say, this welcome news is worthy of celebration as the church worldwide increases in its desire and commitment to fulfill the Great Commission. However, concerns were noted as well. These new waves of non-Western missionaries face daunting challenges when it comes to educating their children. Eric Smith, field director of Philippine Challenge, Inc., also with OC International, reported that, of the many Filipino missionary families he has had direct contact with over the years, no more than two families with children have served longer than eight years as foreign missionaries. Lynda Shingledecker-Wheeler (SIL International) revealed that some Latin American pastors have confessed that they now hesitate to encourage a call to missions in their churches because of the limited support systems available, including educational opportunities for their children.
Complexities of a Complex Problem
For the Western missionary agencies, the solution to their educational problem has been to develop and support missionary schools and homeschooling opportunities. But even established missionary schools have faced challenges in providing a suitable education system for the wide range of Western missionary families. It has not been uncommon for Western missionaries to leave the field and return to their home country because their children could be better served by the educational options available there. But the non-Western missionary education challenge is far greater and more complex than anything the Western missionaries and their agencies
have faced. Consider the following:
- The established missionary schools around the world are modeled primarily on the curriculum from one or two Western nations. Thus, a level of proficiency in speaking and writing in English is expected of their students. Even though some schools seek to continually recruit ESL (English as a second language) instructors, they are in constant short supply. Non-English-speaking students, especially older ones, find themselves significantly disadvantaged in such schools.
- Many of these new sending nations are targeting countries and people groups that are isolated and located far from established Christian schools. These groups do not have the resources to establish schools in those areas, nor would a Christian school be welcomed in many of them.
- The use of national schools as an educational option may not be suitable for some of these missionaries, especially in areas where schools are heavily influenced by non-Christian or anti-Christian religions and philosophies.
- Tuition rates at established international Christian schools are likely to be cost-prohibitive for these new missionaries.
- Some Latin American countries do not recognize the education gained in another country, even a neighboring Latin American country.
- Many higher education opportunities in these non-Western countries depend on students’ having received a quality primary and secondary education, which is most often associated with private national schools within these countries. Furthermore, national entrance exams require oral and written proficiency in the national language—a proficiency that often diminishes as students are in a setting in which instruction is delivered in a language different from their own.
- The homeschooling option, enjoyed by many Western missionary families, is often unheard of, underdeveloped, unrecognized, and in some of these new sending countries, even prohibited by law.
There is at least one other important issue related to education but outside its traditional boundaries that must be addressed. This issue concerns an understanding by the sending agencies, the sending churches, and the non-Western missionaries themselves of the transitional and cross-cultural issues related to providing their children with a healthful upbringing in another culture and a successful transition back home. This avenue appears not to have been explored by many of the new sending groups.
What to Do
Africa is home to the greatest growth in Christianity in the world right now. In 1900 there were about 9 million Christians in all of Africa. By the year 2000 the number had grown to 380 million.
The purpose of these meetings was not to provide the non-Western sending churches and mission agencies with a final solution to these problems. Rather, it was to lend them assistance in dealing with these growing concerns. Thus, several options were presented as possible solutions.
To begin with, expecting established international Christian schools to be the sole solution for the educational needs of this population group is impractical. However, international Christian schools can and should play an active role in assisting these new missionaries with the education of their children. Providing tuition scholarships and ESL services, validating homeschooling records, developing multi-tracked curricula, and freeing up classroom space for non-Western groups to use are reasonable possibilities. Already, some schools are preparing for a future with dual majorities (Western and non-Western students) in their schools. Pan American Christian Academy (Brazil) and Hope Academy (Kyrgyzstan) run dual-track curricula and/or have altered their curriculum to provide educational opportunities for both Western and non-Western students.
Another growing option for non-Western missionaries, again not without its difficulties, is to homeschool their children. This option seems to hold the greatest promise for Filipino missionaries, who are unfamiliar with the concept even though some curricula have been developed in their country. Even for missionaries coming from Latin American countries where homeschooling is prohibited, the validation of homeschooling accomplishments through a transcript issued by an international Christian school is often accepted. We cannot say at this time whether the homeschooling option is viable for French- or English-speaking African missionary families.
In addition, the development and support of proper pre-field orientation and reentry seminars similar to those developed by Western organizations must be addressed. Groups such as Interaction and the Association of Christian Schools International have created successful programs of this kind, and their materials need only be translated and contextualized for distribution to these new sending nations. Missionaries and other Westerners could lend training support to non-Western missionary organizations and sending churches to help them convey the complexities of leaving one’s home country, raising a family overseas, and transitioning well back into their home culture.
Planned Consultation
By the end of the day, the participants had a much broader (and personally overwhelming) sense of the complexities involved in the education and well-being of non-Western missionary families. Discussing these issues was just one focus of the meeting. The most important reason for our coming together was to develop a plan of assistance for non-Western missionaries committing their lives and families to the work of world evangelism. The group decided that the best way to do so was by developing and sponsoring a consultation for non-Western mission agencies and sending churches. The consultation was appropriately named Consultation on Filipino MK Education, and the meeting was held November 21–22, 2005, in Manila.
It is important to note that this consultation approached the subject not from an entirely Western perspective but from a shared perspective that includes what other non-Western mission groups, specifically the Korean and Chinese sending churches and agencies, have learned about these issues and how they have addressed them. The desired outcome will be for Filipino mission agencies and churches to approach constructively the challenge of educating and caring for the families of their missionaries, using deliberate and meaningful avenues that address the problems they face. The outcomes of this consultation will be vitally important to non-Western families that God is calling into His work of world evangelism.
For the existing international Christian schools and related service organizations, the task of assisting non-Western missionary families with the education of their children presents new and varied challenges, many of them not yet imagined. We are presented with an exciting opportunity to think beyond and outside the traditional Western education models and curriculum restrictions and to offer alternative educational support for a brand-new membership within the mission community. As I have reflected on this challenge, I am reminded that this situation, as overwhelming as it may seem, is God’s doing, and therefore He has already planned the solutions for it. Also, I am continually reminded of Jesus’ words: “From everyone who has been given much, much will be required; and to whom they entrusted much, of him they will ask all the more” (Luke 12:48, NASB). Western missionary agencies and organizations that support educational options for missionary families are poised to share in an exciting partnership in furthering God’s plan for reaching all nations with His salvation message. Imagination, innovation, and resource sharing will be necessary as we begin to partner together for God’s purposes.
Preparing for the Next Wave Q1 2005–2006