
When your Fifth Grader is the Teacher…
Notes from Millennials on the Future of Education
Author’s Note:
This blog post was originally written in 2012. Since that time the research has confirmed still more of these insights and the foresight of the Millennials interviewed. It is reposted here with minor edits. The year 2025 is closer now, and providing a truly Christian educational option to families has never been more important – around the globe.
The Future of Education
I presume, since you are reading this post, you care very much about the relationship between faith and scholarship – and that motivates your teaching philosophies and methodologies. You are teaching in a Christian school or you are concerned with the education of your own children – or both. You want your students to know what they believe and to influence culture as Christ-followers. I consider myself a compatriot.
My advisors observed that (in their collective humble opinion) today’s Christian schools and learning centres need a reality check. So I took a look at some data-supported trends impacting Christian schools and Millennials to draw some momentous conclusions – and together with my millennial group developed a few recommendations for consideration as we look to the future of Christian education.
The Race for Students
Public schools are in hot pursuit of our students. Many state agencies are signaling their intention to “recapture” families of students in private education. They offer more perks each year: free textbooks, curriculum counseling, online courses, and innovative instructional programs. In Alaska, the state has effectively “recaptured” Christian homeschoolers with attractive resources and curriculum restrictions, and they are now “pursuing” small private school students – and several states are close behind. Free education is hard to compete with, especially when the demand for a Christian alternative appears to be waning. Our schools must offer a sufficiently superior alternative to outweigh the price tag.
Millennials as the Teachers
What is the current status of our future teachers? In 2025, Christian education will rely on millennial teachers to fill out their faculty; yet millennial disinterest in religious institutions is increasing. Where will we find them? Our middle school and high school students will not only be the parents of our future students; they will be faculty members.
Mr. Youth and Intrepid, two global marketing firms, combined forces to study millennial interests and career goals. The results, released in 2010, concluded the number one reason Millennials change jobs is they simply want a change. Security, a long-term career, and developing expertise in a single field are not as important to millennials as innovation, continual learning, and the excitement of a new challenge.
Might the potentially hard-to-find millennial teacher bring these values into Christian education? A starting point for projection is the present millennial environment. My Millennials highlight the tension between their relationship with technology and their teachers’.
A High-Tech Education
Preparing the Next Generation of Christian Educators
What about your 5th grader turned teacher? Well, in 2025 she won’t be in grammar school anymore. She will certainly have many new ideas for how to create the environment her peers are seeking for their children. We need to prepare to listen and learn. My Millennials have a few recommendations to get us started:
- Go tech. Get comfortable with technology in and out of the classroom. If we’re going to mentor its proper use, we need to be familiar with the advantages and disadvantages of using existing tools and acquiring new technologies. The learning curve is sometimes steep, but the results are worth it.
Note: In recent years, the pendulum has swung. We need to help today’s students learn to enjoy tech-free spaces. At the same time, the more familiar today’s faculty and administration are with technology, the more credibly we can guide its most appropriate use – and redirect its abuse. - Look around. Frequent reality checks are a must. While it’s easy to be consumed with the business of the school, the world is moving at an increasingly accelerated pace. If we hope for future parents to pay for the Christian alternative with free education in hot pursuit, we must assure them we have some understanding of the society we are equipping their children for; and something better to offer.
- Be relevant. My Millennials communicated passionately on this point. Many of their peers have distanced themselves from anything “Christian.” The “Christian” answers from their alternate “school” reality seemed to lack relevance. A genuine Christian education must be relevant. The Good News is for the generations following us and those following them. It didn’t cease to be Good News with Baby Boomers and Gen Xers: it is for today, tomorrow, and the future. Our faith, our hope, and our approach to education must align. When they do, the results are extraordinary.
The only thing we can be certain of in society and in education is change; yet, I believe these recommendations will never outlast their usefulness. We will continue aspiring to be technologically adaptive, and we must always strive to be real and relevant.



