Obamessiah, St. Marcus, WELS

Wisconsin Interest
Volume 18, No. 1
March, 2009

Miracle at St. Marcus
On the Frontlines of reform with writer Sunny Schubert

Henry Tyson shows how urban education can succeed in the right setting.


"I never wanted to be involved in helping the poor. My mother was born in Africa and was always very sympathetic toward the poor and people of other races. But the whole inner-city thing came about during my senior year at Northwestern," says the superintendent of Milwaukee's St. Marcus School.

"I was majoring in Russian, so in the summer of my junior year, I went to Russia. I absolutely hated it - just hated it. So when I got back to school, I realized I had a problem figuring out what to do next," he remembers.

About that time, he was having a discussion with a black friend, "and she basically told me I didn't have a clue what it was like in the inner city. She challenged me to do an ‘Urban Plunge,' which is a program where you spend a week in an inner-city neighborhood.

"We were in the Austin neighborhood, on the West Side of Chicago. It was a defining moment for me," he says. "I was so struck by the inequity and therefore the injustice of it all. I couldn't believe that people lived - and children were growing up! - in such an environment, such abject poverty."

"I knew after that week that I wanted to work with the urban poor. I felt a deep tug, like this was what I was meant to do. In my view, it was like a spiritual calling."

Tyson's Journey

It was the start of several journeys for Tyson: an educational journey into the failing milieu of inner-city schools; a physical journey that would carry him to St. Marcus Lutheran School on Milwaukee's north side, and a spiritual journey that would lead him to the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod.

The programs he oversees at St. Marcus are the embodiment of everything he learned along the way. Tyson's students are proof of the ability of poor black children to perform just as well academically as their affluent white peers when placed in a highly structured and challenging environment, and testimony to the power of the Christian Gospel to transform lives.

Tyson, meanwhile, has become a powerful spokesman for the successes of the 20-year-old Milwaukee Parental Choice Program. He is an eloquent and elegant speaker with a direct gaze that conveys the strength of his convictions. It doesn't hurt that he is Hollywood-handsome as well, looking like he might be actor Colin Farrell's older, smarter brother.

AmeriCorps Volunteer

The 36-year-old bachelor was 4 when his family moved to the United States from Britain, but three years later, his parents sent him back to attend Felsted School in the south of England. That decision, he says, was based partly on tradition - I had five older siblings, three of whom were at Felsted - and partly because they were disappointed in American schools. Years later, he would come to share that disappointment.

After graduating from Northwestern, he joined AmeriCorps and was assigned to work with Habitat for Humanity in Chicago. "I became involved with several Habitat families, and through them I became aware of how bad many of the Chicago public schools were."

Then his boss invited him to dinner, where Tyson met fellow guest Arne Duncan, who would eventually become the reforming CEO of the Chicago public schools and President Barack Obama's pick for U.S. secretary of Education.

That night, over dinner, Duncan convinced him that education "was a more involved, systemic solution than housing" for the problems facing the urban poor.
Tyson enrolled in DePaul University, earning a master's degree in secondary education. "I had a good experience at DePaul, but I did not learn what I consider to be the critical elements of great urban education there. I'm a firm believer that great urban educators aren't educated on college campuses - only in great urban schools."

Which the Chicago high school where he began teaching emphatically was not. His fellow teachers lacked passion and commitment. The students were out of control. The classrooms were chaotic.

After a year, he moved to a suburban high school, which was somewhat better. But then a former colleague, Kole Knueppel, called him up. Knueppel had moved to Milwaukee to become principal of St. Marcus Lutheran School.

"You've got to come up here!" Tyson remembers Knueppel telling him. "We're going to do great things!"

Testing His Ideas

St. Marcus was about to undergo a $5 million renovation that would allow the student body to expand from 220 to 330. But best of all, St. Marcus would give Tyson the freedom to put his ideas concerning urban education into practice, and he would be surrounded by fellow teachers who shared his passion and commitment.


That was six years ago. Today, Tyson is superintendent of St. Marcus. Knueppel has moved on to head Hope High School, St. Marcus' "sister" choice school.


"When I got hired at St. Marcus, the first thing they did was send me to New York to look at a KIPP (Knowledge Is Power Program) school." He has visited other excellent urban schools in Houston and Chicago as well.

"What I saw in those schools revolutionized my thinking. When you walk into a great urban school, you can tell the difference immediately."

"The kids are focused. The teachers are teaching with passion. It's happy and calm.
The school day is crazy-long. There's direction. You see college stuff everywhere. And if you talk to a student, they make eye contact. They talk confidently, and they're polite."

That's what St. Marcus is like. At first glance, it looks like any school, albeit cleaner and neater than some. But the difference between St. Marcus and an average public school becomes apparent when students are between classes.

There is no jostling, no yelling, no slamming each other into lockers. The students, wearing uniforms of blue pants, blue blazers, white shirts and red ties, walk swiftly and quietly to their next class.

And they are excelling. Tyson pushed for them to take standardized tests, which are not required for private schools, and they are testing far ahead of their demographic peers.

Like their teachers, they are serious about learning. They arrive at St. Marcus as early as 6:30 a.m., and middle-school students often stay as late as 8:30 p.m. Tardiness, truancy and any kind of disruptive behavior are met with instantaneous discipline.

In the early grades, the teachers eschew educational fads like the new math or "whole language" reading instruction. Instead, they focus on the basics. In the upper grades, the curriculum is rigorous. Students are expected to complete three to four hours of homework every night. Along with academic subjects (including Latin), they have daily religious instruction.

"The transformative power of the Gospel of Jesus Christ" is a crucial element of St. Marcus' success, Tyson says, and in his own life.

"I have never been a good Christian," he says. "Christ said only God is good. I am a miserable, broken sinner saved by grace, which brings me a tremendous amount of joy."

He and his colleagues are driven to share that joy with their students.
"We teach these kids that ‘God made you, God loves you, and God has a purpose for you. And when they know that, they will do anything to serve him."

"Love is absolutely the No. 1 ingredient" at St. Marcus, Tyson says. "The kids don't go nuts on us because they know we love them. There are all kinds of things you can do to kids in terms of discipline when they know that they are loved."

Long Hours, Hard Work

Likewise, St. Marcus teachers are willing to put in 12-hour days in service to God and their students.

"Any school that is successful has very extended hours," Tyson says. "That single point right there is absolutely critical. As long as the schools want to stick with the 6.5-hour day, we will never be successful.


"I never have to fight with my teachers. I think there are a lot of teachers out there who would jump at the chance to teach at a school like this. When you give a teacher the opportunity to change lives, the job becomes a consuming passion."

"Teaching is impossibly difficult. Period. You get better with practice. That's one thing that's wrong with our teacher training programs: Students don't spend enough time in the classroom, not enough time practicing.

"Urban education is not rocket science. Our model is largely stolen. People who are serious about school reform need to ask themselves why St. Marcus is more successful than most inner-city public schools at about half the cost," Tyson says.
"What we do here works. We should be replicating what works, but society has chosen not to."

Sunny Schubert is a Monona freelance writer and a former editorial writer for the Wisconsin State Journal.

More about St. Marcus


Located on Milwaukee's near north side, St. Marcus Lutheran School and its adjoining church and parsonage occupy a whole city block in the Brewer's Hill neighborhood.


The school, 2215 N. Palmer St., opened in 1875 to serve the children of the German immigrants who founded the church. Decades later, white families began leaving and were replaced by black families, most of them low-income.

Today, the neighborhood is again changing, with poor people moving out as the area gentrifies. "When I first started teaching here in 2002, most of our students came from the neighborhood," Tyson says. "Today, the only students from the neighborhood are our pastor's kids."

St. Marcus School has 330 students, up from 220 when Tyson started. Most are black; 85% are low-income students who bring with them $6,500 vouchers through the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program. St. Marcus' per-pupil expenditures are about $7,500 a year, compared to $13,000 per pupil in the Milwaukee Public Schools.

There are 45 full-time teachers and staff members. Teachers are paid almost as much as they would receive in the public schools, but are expected to work much longer days.

The school offers classes from four-year-old kindergarten through eighth grade. Admission is selective only in that returning students and their siblings are given priority. Any remaining vacancies are filled by a blind lottery among applicants.

St. Marcus does not cherry-pick its students, and Tyson says more than a handful would be considered "special needs" by the public schools because of learning, emotional or behavioral problems. Almost all respond to St. Marcus' formula of love and discipline.

In his six years at St. Marcus, Tyson says, "there have been about 10 kids we just couldn't reach. I very much regard it as our failure, not theirs."


For more about the school, go to: http://www.stmarcus.org/school/

***

GJ - Pay close attention to St. Markus and its relationship to Church and Change. Al Sorum, the heresiarch of The Sausage Factory, is also involved in this.

The voucher program seems like a great way to have heavily subsidized religious schools. The program began because industry leaders were appalled at the products of the public school system. But this is still a government-controlled school system. Liberals like Jeske and Sorum are quick to pounce on the government buck and plead for foundation funds. Then they sell this as a conservative program.

Surprise us some day and do something with your own money, St. Markus.

The best solution is to return to no taxation for schools and no funding for schools. Every family can fund its own education, whether at home or in convenient groups of home-schoolers, or private schools.

Public school teachers are so passive that they let grade school children hit them and spit on them. "Nothing can be done," I was told. I said, "Anyone who puts up with that is a fool." An education major asked, "What would you do?" I said, "Walk out. Eventually there would be a shortage." I went on to shock and appall the class by saying all tax money should be withdrawn. Schools are major centers of the illegal drug trade and also serve as promoters of legal but excessive drugging of students.

Social Security was invented in Europe to make people dependent upon the government and prevent social unrest. Most people would agree now that government control of any entity eventually freezes initiative, cost-cutting, and independent thinking.

FAQs: Frequently Avoided Questions

There is nothing like this aroma to get people
into the Popcorn Cathedral of Rock.


Q: Did you have a mid-week Lenten service?
A: We were planning for our small-group ministry.

Q: How much money are you getting for this circus?
A: None of your business because it is Other People's Money.

Q: Why does it take two full-time people to do so little church work?
A: The job is not done until the grant money is gone.

Q: Why start a mission one block from a huge congregation already working in the downtown?
A: Because we got the money to do it.

Q: What is the monthly cost for the lease, electrical, and other overhead items?
A: This is God's work and well worth it.

Q: When is your website going to have some original Gospel content?
A: As soon as we get some from Craig Groeschel and Andy Stanley.

Mid-week Lenten Service

Paul Speratus wrote one of the first Lutheran hymns, #377, facing death for his teaching of Gospel truths.

Mid-Week Lenten Vespers


Pastor Gregory L. Jackson

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/bethany-lutheran-worship

Bethany Lutheran Worship, 6 PM Phoenix Time

The Hymn #552 Eventide 2.11
The Order of Vespers p. 41
The Psalmody Psalm 1 p. 123
The Lection John 15:1-10

The Sermon Hymn # 377 vss 1-5 Es ist das Heil 2.1

The Sermon – The Treasures of Heaven

The Prayers
The Lord’s Prayer
The Collect for Grace p. 45

The Hymn #377 vss 6-10 Es ist das Heil 2.1

God Gives the Increase in 1 Corinthians 3:4-9

1 Corinthians 3:4 For while one saith, I am of Paul; and another, I am of Apollos; are ye not carnal? 5 Who then is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers by whom ye believed, even as the Lord gave to every man? 6 I have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase. 7 So then neither is he that planteth any thing, neither he that watereth; but God that giveth the increase. 8 Now he that planteth and he that watereth are one: and every man shall receive his own reward according to his own labour. 9 For we are labourers together with God: ye are God's husbandry, ye are God's building.


St. Paul’s mission to the Gentiles placed him in danger many times, even though he did not run away from God’s presence. The apostolic letters to the Corinthians leave little doubt that he encountered a host of major problems—from childish strife to gross immorality and desecration of the Lord’s Supper. This particular passage deals with the party spirit dividing the congregation, 1 Corinthians 1:11. Some identified with Paul, some with Apollos. [26] It should not surprise us that today conflict in the congregation is caused by exactly the same problem—an emphasis upon the person and a lack of trust in the efficacy of the Word.
Paul first attacked the problem of strife by negating the effectiveness of the individual. The ministry does not derive its divine power from personalities but from the Word. Our temptation to rely upon salvation by works, in spite of our confession, is revealed by the tendency to compare and contrast men when they are only instruments of God’s power. One cannot even compare the type of word, as Paul stated:

I have planted, Apollos watered;
but God gave the increase.
1 Corinthians 3:6

Many people find their gardening efforts thwarted because the seeds they planted did not germinate well. The proper amount of moisture needed for germination is taken for granted in America, unlike in Paul’s world. [27] We do not plant the last of our seed (Psalm 126:5) with tears. But where rain is rare and food is precious, the watering of the sown crop is essential. Paul’s comparison reminds us that planting and watering are both necessary, yet only God can give the growth.

J-230
"On what has now been sown
Thy blessing, Lord, bestow;
The power is Thine alone
To make it spring and grow.
Do Thou in grace the harvest raise,
And Thou alone shalt have the praise."
John Newton, 1779, cento, alt., "On What Has Now Been Sown," The Lutheran Hymnal, #46, St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1941.

J-231
“The work in Corinth was that of obtaining a spiritual crop. To Paul’s lot it fell to break the ground and to plant the seed of the Word; God caused the seed to strike root and to spring up. Then came Apollos and tended the young plants by developing the life of faith, by confirming the believers in their Christian knowledge; God’s merciful power accompanied his efforts and caused the plants to bring forth fruit. It follows, then, that neither he that plants nor he that irrigates is anything; they are mere instruments in the hand of God, the Lord of the harvest, who alone gives the growth, and to whom, therefore, all glory must be given: He is everything, He alone remains, all others are excluded.”
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible, The New Testament, 2 vols., St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1921, II, p. 99.

The negation of the person is repeated in 1 Corinthians 3:7. Neither the sower nor the one who waters is anything. The only One Who causes growth is God. Paul’s inspired argument destroys the foundation for any strife about the abilities and labor of various people. The missionary who begins a congregation is nothing. The man who helps to germinate the work of the congregation is nothing. God causes the increase while we go through the motions.

J-232
"But ye have not the power to create faith. For there is a great difference between planting and giving the growth; as Paul says to the Corinthians: 'I planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase.' 1 Corinthians 3:6"
Sermons of Martin Luther, 8 vols., ed., John Nicholas Lenker, Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1983, II, p. 362.

J-233
“The two aorists: ‘I planted,’ ‘he watered,’ point into the past—the men did their little work and are gone. So it is still: each performs his little instrumental task and leaves. When he is describing God’s activity Paul writes the imperfect hu;xanen (gave the increase) which refers to an act begun in the past but going on and on indefinitely, for the tense is open and sets no terminus. Paul and Apollos have left Corinth, God is still there and causing the growing. Why quarrel about men when the Corinthians should unite in praising God?”
R. C. H. Lenski, Corinthians, Columbus: Wartburg Press, 1947, p. 128.

Those who doubt the power of the Word alone are exasperated by this explanation, saying, “If God can do everything and does everything, where do we fit in? Why even try?” In a world governed by Law, it does seem strange to say that God does everything, but nothing is more liberating than realizing we only need to be faithful. Pharisaical weakness makes us want to glory in our own deeds and not in God’s power, so we are inclined to adulterate the Gospel, sell it as a commodity, cheapen it, or make it appealing as a way of proving our worth. [28] The antidote is to boast about God rather than ourselves:

KJV 1 Corinthians 1:31 That, according as it is written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord. (Jeremiah 9:24)



J-234
"And it is of advantage, so far as can be done, to adorn the ministry of the Word with every kind of praise against fanatical men, who dream that the Holy Ghost is given not through the Word, but because of certain preparations of their own, if they sit unoccupied and silent in obscure places, waiting for illumination, as the Enthusiasts formerly taught, and the Anabaptists now teach."
Article XIII, The Sacraments, 13, Apology of the Augsburg Confession, Concordia Triglotta, St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1921, p. 311. Tappert, p. 213. Heiser, p. 95.

Verse nine concludes the argument with an invocation of the Triune God. Paul holds the distinct office of the preaching ministry, making him, with all of his faults, a co-worker with God. He would have been shocked beyond measure to have all the members considered ministers too. They, with all of their faults, are the cultivation of God and the building of God. The three-fold expression emphasizes the preacher employing the power of God’s Word while the congregation enjoys the growing and the edifying accomplished by the Holy Spirit working through the Word alone. Thus we have a simple, yet profound way to remember the faithful work of the Christian Church:
The Word and Sacraments – Of God
The Growth of Souls – Of God
The Strengthening of the Congregation – Of God.



About Paul Speratus – copied from http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Lib/Speratus.htm

About the year 1506 he began his activity as a pastor in the bishopric of Augsburg. He remained a Catholic priest for over ten years. In 1517 he even wrote a poem in honor of Martin Luther’s famous opponent, Johann Eck. But very soon Martin Luther’s writings and the reform movement in Wittenberg began to bear influence upon him. At first, however, he hoped, like Martin Luther, that a reform could be carried through within the Church, so that celibacy and monastic vows among the clergy might be abolished. With courage and hope he took up the reform measures, when he became dean of Würtzburg, where both the bishop and several other leading men agreed with him. Speratus even went so far as to marry. This was several years previous to Martin Luther’s marriage. But the district was placed under a new archbishop, who was a very strict Catholic. When he learned that Speratus had broken the law of celibacy, he deposed him from office in 1520. Speratus and his wife then left for Salzburg, where the archbishop was friendly to the Reformers. He was again given the office of dean and at once resumed his efforts at reform work. But Speratus was undaunted and outspoken, and when he reprimanded his bishop for penuriousness he had to give up his position. On the way to a new field of labor in Hungary he appeared in Vienna and agitated against monastic vows and celibacy. He gained many followers. But he was excommunicated and accused of heresy. His life was now in danger, hence he left Vienna secretly and set out for Wittenberg. He journeyed through the town of Iglau in Moravia, and there he found both the officials and the people very favorable towards the reform movement. He was elected their pastor and preached with great fervor concerning the grace of God in Christ. He gained an extensive following. But a complaint had been sent to the king, and Speratus was soon cast into prison. For the second time he was face to face with death. But these trials only had a ripening influence upon him. Until this time he had been undaunted and daring; from now on a quiet resignation settled upon his mind and actions. From his prison chamber he sent many fervent letters to his dear congregation in Iglau Here he also wrote his famous hymn “Es ist das Heil uns kommen her” using a chorale melody from the 15th century. His imprisonment did not last so very long, however. The young emperor took another view of the matter and ordered the bishop to release him on condition that he should leave Moravia. Then he went at once to Wittenberg, 1523. Speratus was heartily received by Martin Luther and his friends. It was just at the time when Martin Luther was laboring to furnish the people with hymns in their mother tongue. In one of the very first hymn collections, the so-called Achtliederbuch, three of the hymns of Speratus were included, together with four by Martin Luther and one hymn by an unknown writer. Speratus assisted Martin Luther in many ways. Martin Luther held him in high esteem because of his piety and great learning. When Duke Albrecht of Brandenburg sought Luther’s advice concerning the introduction of the Reformation in his state, Martin Luther recommended Speratus for this work. The duke acted accordingly. Speratus became the first palace chaplain of Königsberg, 1524, and from 1530 bishop of Marienwerder, Pomerania.

Cutbacks at Our Lady of Sorrows, St. Louis

Leonard Sweet, professor of wikeletics, futurist, and world-class purveyor of intellectual Spam, should have prepared Concordia, St. Louis for future upheavals when he lectured there.


March 11, 2009

SEMINARY REGENTS ADDRESS FINANCIAL CHALLENGES

ST. LOUIS—The Board of Regents of Concordia Seminary has received reports on how the current economic situation is affecting the Seminary’s finances, and it has responded. Meeting February 13, 2009, and again in a special telephone conference call February 26, the Board passed several resolutions to help the Seminary cope with the situation.


Faced with an expected $4 million operating deficit for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2009, and a significant decrease in expected income for the following fiscal year, the Board has authorized trimming payroll expenditures by some 20%. Initially, the Seminary will offer regular full-time faculty and staff who are at least 55 years of age and who have served the Seminary for at least five years a voluntary early retirement incentive offer. “While those who choose this option will no longer be full-time employees of the Seminary, some will continue their service to the Seminary in a limited capacity through adjunct teaching and other activities,” said Dr. Dale A. Meyer, Seminary President. “Because those who retire can continue to teach, we are confident that the Seminary will retain its reputation for having an exceptional faculty and staff.”

In a previous action, in January, the Board froze salaries for Seminary employees, accepted voluntary salary reductions from the President and Vice Presidents, and placed some maintenance work on hold. Mr. James Ralls, Chairman of the Regents, indicated that the Board “worked hard and long to address the current financial challenges.” Among the options cited by Mr. Ralls were “increased tuition charges, deficit spending, and cutting further into the value of the Seminary’s endowment.” The Board determined that these options would not be wise at this time and could jeopardize the Seminary’s ability to follow through on important elements of its strategic plan for the future.

The individuals offered the early retirement incentive will have time to consider the offer, which also includes some Seminary assistance for health insurance for those individuals and their covered dependents. To help them in their decision-making process, Concordia Plans will have benefit advisors on-site to answer their questions. “We want to take the best care of our people that we can under the circumstances,” said President Meyer. “We regret that cuts are necessary, but we remain confident that God can bring good from this situation. When we come out of the recession, we’ll see that Concordia Seminary seized the present economic downturn to take giant steps into delivering 21st century theological education. When that future comes, our ‘refined’ Concordia Seminary will be fulfilling its mission in the ‘new normal,’ not lost in the new realities. For now, however, the Lord is allowing us to be painfully refined.”

The early retirement offer is the first step in reducing the personnel expenses of the Seminary, but other personnel reductions will most likely be necessary. Expense cuts are also being made in other areas of the Seminary’s operations. Delaying some maintenance projects, freezing salaries, and tightening program budgets will contribute cost savings to help offset the anticipated deficit.

Dr. Meyer met with faculty and staff members on March 11 to explain the actions of the Regents. “I am not happy with this unexpected situation,” he said, “but by taking these actions at this time, the Regents are seeking to avoid accumulating debt and other consequences down the road that could jeopardize the Seminary’s mission.”

The Seminary is nearing the final year of its How Will They Hear? Campaign that, to date, has “been blessed with so many gifts from so many kind friends and supporters,” said Dr. Meyer. “We pray the Campaign is successful, despite the current economic conditions, so that the Seminary can regain a strong financial position for the important work it is called upon to do.”