This helpful booklet for those new to your board or considering joining a board. This booklet could be a simple check in for boards as well, to ensure you are on track with good governance.

Serving on a school board is both a wonderful privilege and a great challenge. You have an opportunity to take the biblical mandate of parenthood, to teach your child “in the ways of the Lord,” a step further by being part of a team that shapes and directs the governing decisions of your school community. You get to be part of the challenge of ensuring that the board is active and dedicated to upholding the vision and mission of the school community that you have engaged with, as a parent, or perhaps a grandparent, or even friend of Christian schooling. As you go down this path, you will get to see the best and, at times perhaps, the worst of your school community.

When the founders of Christian schooling began to build and develop Christian schools, they were committed to providing an education that was reflective of their home and church environments where God’s word was explored and became the lens through which we perceive all of life.

A Christian school community understands that “every member of the community is recognized as having an office: a particular way of serving” (Hanscamp, 2017). If you are voted in or invited to be a part of your Christian school board, you are taking up a very important “office” to serve the Lord with wise leadership and rigorous attention to the principles of effective governance.

It’s our hope that this booklet will help you understand the wonderful privilege it is to serve as a member of the Board of Directors in a Christian Education National (CEN) school. It’s a support to our existing resources including the Board Member’s Handbook and our online training for boards.