Baptist Group Offers Itself as Resource to Churches Starting a School
by Allie Martin
July 12, 2006
(AgapePress) - - The executive director of the Southern Baptist Association of Christian Schools (SBACS) is trying to help pastors nationwide organize viable alternatives to public school education. The SBACS was formed to help make Christian schooling available to more families. The organization encourages churches throughout the nation's largest evangelical denomination to seriously consider opening Christian schools. Among the services it offers are school management consulting and materials on how to begin a Christian school. SBACS says approximately 600 Christian schools are currently supported and operated by Southern Baptist churches and state conventions.
Ed Gamble, SBACS executive director, says his group has introduced a new workshop called "Christian School 101" to help pastors and church and lay leaders overcome many of the obstacles involved with starting a private Christian school.
"[The workshop] starts with the basics," Gamble explains. "It assumes they know nothing except that God may be interested in their church housing or sponsoring a Christian school or some other kind of kingdom education network. So we want to teach them how to do it."
A proponent of home schooling and Christian education, Gamble says the time for Southern Baptist churches to offer the public a new alternative education system is long overdue.
"We believe Southern Baptists could basically own a vast, new 'public' school system," he explains, "public in the sense that it is open to the public and yet owned by us so that we get to call the shots about what's taught and who does the teaching."
Other services offered by SBACS include assistance in recognizing and rewarding outstanding student scholars and musicians, connecting students with Christian colleges and universities, and a program designed to schools and their students develop relationships with those colleges and universities during the early high school years.
Allie Martin, a regular contributor to AgapePress, is a reporter for American Family Radio News, which can be heard online.
