from March 2002 IAPCHE Newletter
The IAPCHE Secretariat is in the process of updating its brochure and its Membership Directory. Both will indicate that we now have five membership categories: individual, institutional, affiliate, associate and consulting members. Currently IACPHE has 360 individual members, 37 institution members, 9 affiliate members, 16 associate members, and 5 consutlign members. The IACPHE website www.iapche.org features a directory that is updated monthly. Some have told us that having five kinds of membership is confusing. We intend to recommend to the board that we seek ways to clarify these categories.

The most recent addition to the membership category list is that of consulting members. Consulting members are associations engaged in the development and promotion of Christian higher education on an international level. Presently we are in consultation with five such associations: the Association of Presbyterian Colleges and Universities, the Council for Christian Colleges and Universities, the International Council for Higher Education, the International Forum for Associations of Christian Higher Education and the International Institute for Christian Studies. Each has its own history and works out of its own peculiar perspective. We feel that it is important to be in contact with these international associations. We have much to share with them and much to learn from them -- all the while remembering our own history and maintaining our own peculiar perspective on Christian higher education.

The membership category most often questioned is that of institutional members. As our brochure indicates, we now have 37 institutional members whose primary purpose is to support IAPCHE financially. The question usually asked is, But what do the institutions get out of their membership in the Association? That question can be answered in two ways.

First, there is a sense in which institutions get nothing for becoming members of IAPCHE. Institutions seek and are granted membership in IAPCHE not for what they can get, but for what they can give. The purpose of IAPCHE is the development of integral higher education through networking (primarily of individual scholars and educators who subscribe to the Basis and Purpose of the Association) and related academic activity. Institutional members of IAPCHE support this purpose and the resultant program by way of annual contributions -- determined, in part, by the size of each institution and its ability to pay. It is in this way that institutions give to IAPCHE.

Second, there is a sense in which institutions get everything by becoming members of IAPCHE. It is our conviction that at the heart of any Christian institution of higher education there is a faculty committed to education and scholarship not from a neutral, but from a biblical perspective. That’s what an institution of Christian higher education wants and needs; and that’s what an institution of Christian higher education seeks to get by supporting IAPCHE, because through its program of networking, IAPCHE is concerned to assist Christian scholars and educators -- in all, not only Christian colleges and universities -- in the development of integral Christian scholarship.

During Conference 2000 a number of college and university administrators reported that they were having great difficulty identifying faculty who were Christian, qualified in their fields of investigation, and capable of pursuing their academic work from a biblical perspective. Understandably, these people -- rectors, presidents, provosts, and academic deans -- were most appreciative of IAPCHE’s purpose, program, and projects, especially the Faith and Learning Network and the Christian Academic Studies Certificate. They understood that IAPCHE could be of help to them in dealing with this important need.

IAPCHE’s distinctive purpose also gives it a legitimate place at the table with its consulting members. As we mentioned earlier, each association has its own history and perspective. We should add that each has its own purpose. As far as we know, however, among these associations, only IAPCHE has as its primary purpose the development of integral scholarship for Christian higher education throughout the world. We claim this not with pride, but with gratitude for the opportunity to share this purpose and perspective with others committed to the international promotion of Christian higher education.

Dr. J. B. Hulst