Area High Schools versus Prep Schools

Ichabod is being read in all the synods, so I am getting questions. Today I was asked about the difference between a prep school and an area Lutheran high school.

I think WELS made a big mistake in its failure to make a number of area high schools into prep schools. That would have provided a more unified system and a way of short-circuiting the us vs. them funding that will arise when an area school must be financially supported by individuals and congregations. For example, when WELS stupidly bought the failed Prairie du Chien school from the Roman Catholics, they moved the New Ulm prep school away from a dense population of members to an area where the WELS membership was not so dense. The first thing the New Ulm area did was create an area Lutheran high school, taking away the most likely students who would have attended Prairie. Besides, there is an aversion to having high school children so far from home. Prairie was merged into Northwestern Prep to become Luther Prep, but Prairie built a $500,000 music building during the shut-down. Pure genius.

One question involved the cost per student of a prep school education (synod subsidy). My brothers are CPAs, but that gene bounced right past me. I would have to look over all the reports, assume they are accure, and interpret them. That is not my forte, but more like my pianissimo.

I can talk about a prep school education since our son went to Michigan Lutheran Seminary.

Missouri once had a prep school system. Long ago, the Lutheran leaders knew that a proper college and seminary education would require a good high school. The European model provided students with a balance of all the disciplines with an emphasis on languages. Children learn languages easily and adults seldom have the time, energy, or inclination to learn them later. WELS and Missouri had similar schools but Missouri closed them down in the name of saving money and spending it on missions. Sound familiar? That is the argument in WELS today. Parts of the LCA had prep schools. My college, Augustana (sic), had a prep school.

As I understand it, Missouri started at the sixth grade. They would take a little boy off the farm and turn him into a Latin and Greek scholar. In Walther's day, all dogmatics lectures at St. Louis were delivered in Latin, with the questions and answers in Latin. That was really necessary because the good doctrinal books were in Latin. Much of Luther was still in Latin. And doctrinal discussions always used Latin terms. If the faculty is trained at Fuller, all one needs to do is wave arms in the air and pray, "Balla-llaala-sissa-bommba-achi-wawa."

A modern prep school means that a boy in the 9th grade will enter college with ability in German and Latin, able to start Greek and Hebrew. The college will do the Greek and Hebrew work so the young man can start seminary and follow Lenski and the other good commentaries, instead of reading Calvin and Handfuls on Purpose.

The LCA liberals argued against the value of Greek and Hebrew. They could not see the value of those ancient languages. As a result, the pastors are universally ignorant.

According to my reader, Martin Luther College faculty members could not tell the difference between area Lutheran high graduates and prep graduates. They soon will. Most of the MLC students come from prep schools. Once the preps are gone, MLC will become the Nursing Home on the Hill, next to the statue of Herman the German. "Used to be a college, I hear tell." MLC bought a nursing home to create an instant dorm. God has a way of recycling property.

Area high schools vary in their faculties and size. I have never visited one and have nothing against them. Their local nature makes them vulnerable to student population problems, finances, and quality of faculty. Teaching at a prep is an honor. Michigan Lutheran Seminary had an outstanding faculty when our son was there. The school had a great spirit. Dorms for young men and women meant that distant families could have their children stay there. We could not get our son home on weekends at first, when we lived only 25 miles away. He enjoyed MLS that much.

An education begins with the parents. I tutored Martin in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew. He helped upper classmen with their Latin, got passed out of intro Latin, and later aced the German test (his mother's contribution). Being good in languages was a plus at MLS, not an object of scorn. The school provided an atmosphere of learning. Math was tough. Science was challenging. Piano was required! The school constantly encouraged church vocations. No one was obliged to sign on for a hitch, but they were encouraged to consider it. Area Lutheran high schools, for some reason, do not have that motivating force.

Many Missouri and WELS pastors will say that they entered the ministry as a direct result of their prep school experience. At MLS pastors were respected and their work was considered the highest possible calling. Young women headed far away to Martin Luther College because they wanted to teach in parochial schools when a local state school was easier to attend and promised more opportunity. Not surprisingly, prep schools also promoted marriage and a distinct possibility of very bright but near-sighted kids in the parsonage.

I enjoyed going to MLS with my wife. The atmosphere was great. The school had a wonderful spirit. Dinners meant that all the parents wore red sweaters, since they were Cardinals. The choirs would show off their great talent in music, each group separated by levels of ability. Our son was in the group nicknamed The Bonehead Chorus for their lack of singing ability. Nevertheless, we always got goose-flesh when the choir walked in singing, "God Word in Our Great Heritage" in perfect harmony, a cappella.

The MLS campus was very impressive at the time. The preps got money so that everything was attractive and well maintained. Tuition was a bite out of our tiny budget but not impossible. Another prep school concept is that no one is sent away for lack of funds. Some impoverished students are very bright. The Pieper boys were the sons of a poor widow who had a housekeeper's job at Northwestern College.

I see the prep system as a natural outgrowth of the value placed on the efficacy of the Word in the old days. WELS and Missouri were dirt poor in previous years but rich in their Lutheran heritage. MLS was once called the Plywood Palace because of its lack of funds. Now WELS and Missouri are incredibly rich in funds (really - more on that later) but impoverished in doctrine.

I am not in favor of prep schools as institutions. People worship every brick in some buildings because of their sentimental value. They often become white-washed sepulchres full of dead men's bones, like the soaring quasi-gothic structures of the Episcopal Church. If WELS faces its doctrinal problems and begins with a multi-year study of the Book of Concord, the money and school situation will straighten itself out. The Michiganders need to fight for doctrine rather than the school.

Northwestern College made the same mistake with a feeble effort to save the school. The faculty did not have the spine to make a doctrinal argument. They weakly argued that keeping two colleges was cheaper. That was like telling a murderer that bullets cost money. Church Growth was out to snuff NWC and everyone knew it. Silence was golden and NWC merged into DMLC to become MLC. (Another Northwestern name silenced.)

The first thing the new college did was water down the curriculum of the pre-seminary students by having one track for all students, whether future teachers or future pastors. And for once, the future pastors were taught by women. No wonder they are so sensitive about which coffee beans are used in their Church Growth cafes!