The Quality of the Trainer Impacts the Outcome of the Program
Matthew 10:24
A student is not above his teacher, nor a servant above his master.
Last week we looked at how the quality of trainees in a program will directly impact or effect the training outcomes for every student. Trainers also impact the process in significant ways. Programs employing ineffective trainers will produce unsatisfactory results. The training will always be less than ideal and could have otherwise achieved greater success. Developing quality training staff should be a priority of every institution.
Yes, there are exceptions to every rule, but that is the point – they are exceptions. A young prodigy like Mozart can soon leave his teacher behind, and this has little bearing on the effectiveness of his teacher. In most cases, an ineffective teacher leaves his or her mark on the program and, if we are keen stewards, we will attempt to minimize that negative impact.
Think of it this way. If a training program can anticipate that its alumni will not exceed the quality of the trainers, what is the best that can be expected? The best that can be hoped for is that the program reproduces what it models. You might expect that the trainees will come to look like the trainers. The character deficiencies evident in trainers will likewise be seen in the trainees. The spiritual depth of the trainer will be mirrored in the spiritual depth of the trainees. Jesus said, “it is enough for the student to be like his teacher (Matthew 10:25),” but what if that level of training does not achieve the desired outcomes?
In the same way that care should be taken to select quality students, trainers need to be chosen with the utmost consideration.
Character Qualities, Spirituality and Attitudes
I am not aware of any qualitative studies that research the causes of pastoral ministry attrition and/or retention. The two research projects conducted by the Mission Commission of the World Evangelical Alliance, now published in the books Too Valuable to Lose (book or PDF) and Worth Keeping, demonstrate that the primary causes of attrition from the field of service are brought on by issues relating to character qualities, attitudes and spirituality. This says nothing about effectiveness. However, effective people will make effective ministers. It has now been clear in the minds of missionary trainers that academic learning does not produce the kinds of results that will impact the longevity of service or effectiveness in ministry.
Debates in education have frequently vented about the significance of the Null and the Hidden curricula. These are the things that students learn by a) not teaching them at all (Null, meaning by not teaching something we are implicitly teaching something else.), and b) by accidentally passing on learning unwittingly (Hidden, meaning not intentional and more likely an accidental by-product). It is precisely in the areas of character, spirituality and attitudes that we should be concerned about what we teach accidentally or by not teaching them at all. For example, if our sense of modesty does not permit us to raise the problem of internet addiction to pornography, we are failing our trainees to be aware of this evil and to fight it in their lives and the lives of others.
Our programs may suffer from the greater evil of reinforcing negative character traits, attitudes and spirituality because our trainers do not model the outcomes we want to see achieved in our programs. While we were short of personnel for our training program some suggestions were made to bring people on board who were available to help. In one case, I was familiar with the people and felt an immediate concern because it was not clear that they really wanted to be missionaries. There did not appear to be a happy and contented embracing of the missionary life and calling. How could we have somebody training missionaries who did not really want to be a missionary? Our best trainers are the ones who do not want to be here. They would rather be over there, but for some reason are not able to and are therefore available to train.
There are other issues relating to the quality of training staff. These will be considered next week!
