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Luther Classical College & Other New Schools

Luther Classical College & Other New Schools

Last updated on: January 9, 2025 at 6:00 am by Gene Veith

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Luther Classical College & Other New Schools 2025-01-05T16:36:14-05:00 Gene Veith

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Yesterday we discussed the prospects of reform in higher education, concluding that founding a new college on better principles may be easier and quicker than reforming an existing college. Today, new colleges are coming into existence, including one where I am going to teach part-time.

The Federalist‘s executive editor Joy Pullman has written an article about some of these alternative new institutions entitled Cowboys, Billionaires, And Pastors Break Tough Ground To Build Great Books Colleges.

Some of these are secular, such as the University of Austin, Ralston College, and New College of Florida. These are committed specifically to free speech and academic freedom, ideals that were once universal in the academy but that lately have given way to cancel culture and campus speech codes.

Pullman also cites a number of new conservative Catholic schools, such as the College of Saint Joseph the Worker, Wyoming Catholic College, and Catholic Polytechnic University. She also mentions conservative Protestant schools, such as New St. Andrews and Patrick Henry College, where I used to be a literature professor and Provost. (She notes that PHC students going into the legal profession outscore the Ivy League on the LSAT, the test required for getting into law schools. PHC’s emphasis on academic excellence is something I’m particularly proud of.)

Pullman devotes the most space to Luther Classical College in Casper, Wyoming, which will welcome its first class this Fall. I’ll be on its faculty–that is to say, I’ll be an adjunct faculty member, a part-timer. I’m not coming out of retirement or moving to Wyoming. We worked it out so that I’ll be in residence for several weeks each semester. It will be good for me to do some teaching again, and my wife and I are looking forward to spending time in the wild West once again.

Luther Classical College, as well as most of these other new institutions that Pullman discusses, is a classical school. It offers “liberal education,” not in the sense of political progressivism nor in the sense of “the humanities,” as in most universities today, which have turned the West’s most enduring approach to education into just another disembodied academic specialty. Rather, “liberal” in the sense of freedom, an education designed for “liberty” and for equipping free citizens.

The curriculum of these schools is built around the Great Books, the key thinkers and creators who have formed our civilization, the legacy we must hand down if that civilization is to continue. A liberal education is also integrated, with every subject tied to all the rest, as opposed to the hyper-specialization of contemporary universities, in which a student might learn much about one subject while remaining ignorant of the others.

Luther Classical will also be distinctly Lutheran, with faculty, staff, and students all committed to the Scriptures and the Lutheran Confessions. There is a place for Christian schools that are open to the whole range of Christians; for Christian schools with a missional goal that welcome non-Christians in the hope of evangelizing them; for denominational schools that have a “critical mass” from that particular tradition along with some students outside that tradition. There is also a place for secular schools. But there are also advantages in everyone being united in theology, and that’s the route Luther Classical has chosen to follow. The Lutheran educational tradition has been defined as the classical liberal arts, plus Lutheran catechesis, so Luther Classical will do a lot with theology.

Let me clear up some misconceptions that I have been hearing. Some people in the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod are indignant that we are starting a new college at a time when the colleges in the Concordia University System need the church’s support, with some of them shutting down. The Concordia University schools are full-service institutions, offering scores of majors and vocational tracks. Luther Classical occupies a niche quite different from that of the CUS schools.

The kind of education offered by Luther Classical will be excellent preparation for teachers in the burgeoning number of classical Lutheran day schools. LCC will also offer the ancient languages, so it will be good for pre-seminary students and I realize that the Concordias compete for those. But by far the most students go to college for vocational majors, such as Business and Computer Science, so for those the Concordias are the place to go.

Though “liberal education” is often contrasted with “vocational education,” LCC’s commitment to Lutheran theology means a strong emphasis on vocation, which means most importantly our callings in the family, the state, and the church. A liberal education, which has the effect of sharpening the mind on many levels, can lead to a range of occupations and professions. LCC is even partnering with a vo-tech school in Casper, so that students can spend two years with the liberal arts and then pursue a technical trade.

Besides, LCC is designed to never have more than 300 students. It will always be intentionally small, so as to hold costs down and to ensure the kind of intimate community that works best for this kind of learning.

Not only will LCC refuse money from the federal government, it will not take money from Synod. It operates under the auspices of Mt. Hope Lutheran Church in Casper, not the LCMS.

So I think its impact on the Concordia University System will be minimal.

For more information, go to the LCC website. See also these talks by Rev. Christian Preus, the pastor of Mt. Hope and a board member of LCC, here and here.

Maybe some day you or your children will show up in one of my classes!

Illustration: Projected campus plans for Luther Classical College [not yet built out] via LCC website.

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