Here is a taste of my recent piece at Sojourners: A nurse can learn how to insert an IV tube in a patient’s arm, but how will he develop the fortitude to enter a room filled with people suffering from infectious […]
Christian education
Teaching John Henry Newman’s “What is a University?”
Yesterday in Created and Called for Community we read an excerpt from John Henry Newman‘s “What is a University,” a chapter in his 1852 book The Idea of a University. Newman wrote this book while serving as rector of Catholic […]
Should You Support Your Child’s Decision to Attend a Christian College?
Christian liberal arts colleges came under attack recently by a Southern Baptist theologian named Denny Burk. I was going to blog about his recent tweets, but I did not want to call attention to them. The tweets mischaracterize the work […]
Thoughts on Attorney General William Barr’s Notre Dame Speech
I find myself in agreement with a lot of Barr’s speech. Watch and decide for yourself: [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqknuqy2lo0&w=560&h=315] Here are a few quick thoughts: Barr is correct about the founding father’s view of the relationship between religion and the American […]
David I. Smith on Christian Teaching
What role does spiritual formation play in teaching at Christian colleges? Calvin College pedagogy expert David I. Smith discusses this topic in a recent interview at Faith & Leadership. Here is a taste: Q: So how do Christian beliefs and […]
Alan Jacobs: “Demanding that others stop criticizing your preferred group is a cheap identity-politics move”
Baylor University scholar Alan Jacobs reflects on Mike Pence and the journalists who cover him: VP Mike Pence says, “Criticism of Christian education in America must stop.” No it musn’t. Nobody and nothing is above criticism. Demanding that others stop criticizing your […]
Christian College President Compares LGBT Students to Members of ISIS
Oklahoma Wesleyan University left the CCCU a few years ago. Read all about it here. In a recent op-ed at The Washington Times, Oklahoma Wesleyan president Everett Piper is up to his old tricks. Here is a taste: As a college […]
My Boston Trinity Academy Chapel Talk on Rural America
Get the context here. I gave this short chapel talk to the faculty and students of Boston Trinity Academy on January 16, 2018–JF I am so pleased to be back at Boston Trinity Academy. (BTA) I continue to reflect fondly […]
New in the Mail: “The Pietist Vision of Christian Higher Education”
I just received my copy today. Here is my blurb on the back of the book: I have been reading Chris Gehrz’s blog, “The Pietist Schoolman” for several years and have been cheering him on as he makes a compelling […]
Ernie Boyer on Messiah College
Some of you may have heard of Ernest L. Boyer. He was the Chancellor of the State University of New York, United States Commissioner of Education under Jimmy Carter (this was before Secretary of Education was a cabinet position), and […]
Sorry Rick. They Do Teach American History at California Colleges
From the Daily Kos: Yeah, we know it’s all the rage to demonize California in right-wing circles. But you’d think they’d at least make a mild attempt at shading their falsehoods a bit. Not if you’re Rick Santorum: I was […]
This Week’s Patheos Column: “Education for a Democracy”
GOP presidential candidate Rick Santorum made news recently when he called Barack Obama a “snob” for saying that all Americans should get a college education. He supported his attack on the president with the now popular refrain, “college is not […]
Gustafson Resigns as Stony Brook School Headmaster
After months of complaints from disgruntled alumni, Rob Gustafson has resigned as the headmaster of The Stony Brook School. Here is the official announcement: January 2, 2012 By Board of Trustees The Board of Trustees writes to inform you that […]
The (Economic) Value of a Teacher
Scholars at Harvard and Columbia have concluded that students who are taught by a good teacher will have MAJOR social and economic advantages when they reach adulthood when compared with students who are taught by poor teachers. Here are some […]
This Week’s Patheos Column: “Have You Started a Junto Yet?” (Original Title)
There has been much discussion over the last two decades about the state of the evangelical mind. Books such as Mark Noll’s The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind and, more recently, Karl Giberson and Randall Stephens’s The Anointed: Evangelical Truth […]
What’s Going on at the Stony Brook School?
The Stony Brook School is a private Christian school that brings together the best of pre-collegiate academic rigor with a deep commitment to Christian faith. Such a combination is rare for a Christian high school with evangelical roots, but the Stony Brook […]