08135
February 20, 2008

Teach your children well

PC(USA)-related school helps fill Russian educational void

by Jerry L. Van Marter
Presbyterian News Service

Editor’s note: for informal reflections and photos from Jerry Van Marter’s Feb. 1-12 visit to Presbyterian missionaries in Russia, visit the blog.

The Kargel & Baedeker School in St. Petersburg, founded in 1991 by PC(USA) missionaries Garth and Lyuda Moller. Photo by Jerry Van Marter

ST. PETERSBURG, Russia — Like many older Russian buildings, the exterior of the Kargel & Baedeker School here looks slightly ramshackle. It clearly needs a lot of work.

Stepping inside, though, one finds a beehive of enthusiastic educational activity — students huddled around a computer in one classroom, a physics teacher quietly instructing a tight circle of high-school age students in another, pre-schoolers napping in another room, kids running around the partially-renovated gymnasium, and parents leaning over the shoulders of their children in focused concentration, providing that extra bit of attention that can make the difference between success and failure.

Founded in 1991 by Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) missionaries Garth and Lyuda (pronounced “loo-dah”) Moller, the Kargel & Baedeker School is meeting a number of growing educational needs as Russia slowly emerges from 70 years of communist rule.

“Our greatest strengths are small class sizes and individual attention,” Garth Moller says, comparing K&B to the overtaxed public school system, where class sizes frequently top 40. “The public schools just cannot retain enough teachers.”

Parent involvement is an essential factor in the success of Kargel & Baedeker School. Photo by Jerry Van Marter

Beyond that, Garth Moller adds, “there are a growing number of parents who want Christian education as a component of their kids’ schooling.” Most K&B teachers come from churches — Baptist, Pentecostal, Orthodox — “so the core of our teachers are very good and committed to the school,” he says.

Since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, Russians have enjoyed renewed religious freedom, but the social and economic upheavals of the last 17 years have caused societal breakdowns — alcoholism, drug abuse, broken families, poverty — that have left Russia’s children particularly vulnerable.

“We are getting more and more support from Christian families,” says K&B’s Russian director, Nadezhda Ivanova, “who tell us that Christian education is very important as the crisis in the public schools deepens and moral values continue to collapse.”

Small class sizes and individual attention are the norm at Kargel & Baedeker School. Photo by Jerry Van Marter

The emphasis on values and critical thinking about moral values is even making K&B valuable to non-Christians, Ivanova adds. “Children of non-believers are getting so curious about us when they talk to their friends who are students here,” she says, “that their parents are coming to the school and asking for more information about Christianity. It is an interesting way to possibly spread the faith.”

Proselytising is not the point, Garth Moller says. K&B exists and is growing — enrollment for the spring term topped 100 for the first time — because it excels at preparing students for higher education. “We have graduated three classes, 20 kids total, and every one of them has excelled in the standard state exams which qualify them to continue on,” he says.

In fact, Garth Moller says, “Christian education is our weakest point because it’s so hard to find good teachers.”

The Russian educational system “is not good at teaching people how to think morally and practically,” he says. “Russians have always been strictly rule-oriented so critical thinking about how and why to behave morally has never been emphasized.”

Nadezhda Ivanova, the Russian director of Kargel & Baedeker School. Photo by Jerry Van Marter

The Russian government is considering compulsory moral instruction in Russian schools. “It could be good or bad, depending on how the idea evolves,” Garth Moller says.

Because K&B receives no government funding and very little from churches, K&B is a shoestring operation, constantly in danger of running out of money. Eighty percent of the $165,000 annual budget comes from tuition and there are no reserves. “We’d love to get a scholarship endowment going,” Garth Moller says, “but right now every penny gets plowed back into keeping the school going.”

K&B is not alone. When it was founded there were 30 Christian schools in St. Petersburg. Today there are just three. K&B enjoys support from individuals and churches around the world.

Money is also needed to complete renovations of the building, into which K&B moved a couple years ago. Workers putter away in various places around the building, making what improvements can be afforded now.

K&B is also supported through a non-profit organization, "Peter's Work," which is a public benefit charity, incorporated in California, granted 501(c)3 status by the IRS, and governed by a three person board of directors. Peter's Work takes no overhead for its operational costs, so 100% of contributions is passed on to the K&B ministry. Sam Naylor, along with its founding board members, was instrumental in forming Peter's Work. Sam is a member of Glenkirk Presbyterian Church in San Gabriel Presbytery (the church formerly pastored by General Assembly Council's Deputy Executive Director for Mission, the Rev. Tom Taylor). Sam, a friend of Garth Moller's since childhood, divides his time between teaching at K&B, leading volunteer mission teams who come to serve in Russia, and fundraising.

Garth Moller is undaunted by the challenges K&B faces. He’s been there before. “More and more people are asking if they can bring their kids here,” he says. “It looks like we’ll be adding two, maybe four, more classes in the fall.

“As long as we get through the spring,” he smiles.

To contribute to the ministry of the Rev. Garth Moller at Kargel & Baedeker School, call PresbyTel and ask for Extra Commitment Opportunity account #E200387, or to give online click here. Contributions can also be made through Peter's Work, 130 - 45th Street, Manhattan Beach, CA 90266, (213)300-7078.