John’s Blog

Since our ACSI seminars Corfield Consulting Services has been busy working with six Christian school clients. Most obvious to CCS was that Christian schools need a lot of help in:

• Designing annual fund strategies
• Establishing real development departments with trained officers, staff and a donor tracking system
• Implementing capital campaigns
• Effectively marketing to constituencies, churches & communities
• Undertaking major events that yield significant funding

Of course, the first step in all of these is the feasibility study to determine the priority of needs, constituency interest, opportunities, obstacles and the overall feasibility of funding important needs.

This blog will keep you up to date on our current feasibility studies CCS conducted for clients.

CCS completed the Feasibility study for SVCA in March. The leadership moved quickly to make policy changes and improve programs that were needed to move forward. SVCA appointed a Director of Institutional Advancement, currently being trained by CCS to lead their annual fund drive.

Using the CCS three-tier annual fund plan, SVCA has taken off. Already, a $30,000 gift has been secured for the academy library. One of the SVCA leaders remarked recently:

“Wow! It is amazing what a feasibility study can do.”

In October CCS ran a Champion Golf Tournament Event and raised $72,000 for their annual fund. This was followed up in November by an annual fund kick off banquet which featured Josh McDowell as the keynote speaker. It was reveiled that 18 pledges had been procured for a total of $140,000. With these efforts, SVCA is off to a great start in reaching their goal of $440,000 over a 3 year period.

CCS conducted the feasibility study for this Burgettstown, PA academy in March. Burdened by extreme enrollment drops due to a severe economic downturn in the Tri-state area, CCS was asked to provide serious fund-raising training and assistance.

TCA capitalized on the positive support and energy determined in the study by setting up a major golf tournament through Champion Events. This event raised $42,000. As the TCA Administrator, Marlin Hawley put it:

“This is shaping up to be the biggest annual fund effort that we have ever put together.”

Local business people have been contacted for an apprenticeship program with TCA high school students. This has been received very well in the local business community. Pledges of $6,000, $4,000 and $36,000 have come as a result of these efforts. An annual fund kick off banquet was held in early November with pledges of over $40,000 from teachers and administration.

TCA is well on it’s way to raising their $350,000 goal over 3 years.

JCCS, one of the original independent evangelical Christian schools in Steubenville, OH houses its student body in a very old school facility in Mingo Junction.

JCCS has been offered an opportunity by a local church to build a new school on 11 acres to be donated to the school along with a $1,000,000 gift. The challenge to JCCS was that they match that $$ amount. The CCS survey found that JCCS could match that amount and more. Look for updates next fall.

CCS just completed the interviews for the LCA feasibility study and is in the process of compiling and analyzing the information for the final feasibility report. It was a very positive survey.

CCS will conduct a feasibility study May 10-12.

CCS will conduct a feasibility study May 17-21.

I am very happy this Christmas to be working with so many great clients. I have seen God move ahead of our clients in incredible ways to bring in gifts from totally unexpected donor areas. I am convinced that the Lord wants to keep all good Christian schools in business in these “last days.” I thank God every day for the ministry HE has called us to.

But, I am concerned. There are so many schools that need help and not enough consultants to meet their needs. Our mission has always been to help Christian schools to buy or build facilities that no one can take from them. Today, we find ourselves helping many to discover how raising funds to meet their needs is the best way for them to continue their mission.

I talked to an A Beka representative in Dayton, OH. He lamented that 50 schools have closed their doors in his territory since January 06. Although he said that 15 new schools have opened since then, the differential loss of 35 schools is tragic.

I asked him why they had closed. He answered, “Lack of funding and I am going to take your card and make copies to give to my schools.” Although I am not surprised that schools are closing, I am amazed at that number. If he is correct, and I have no reason to doubt him, the Christian school movement may be in real trouble.

One of my privileges of this year was preceding Josh McDowell at a client’s banquet (I am also glad I didn’t follow him). His point was that only 4% of born-again youth believe in absolute truth with Jesus being that truth. That is down from 65% since he started his ministry.

He went on to say that if there were no Christian schools, that number would probably be zero. He said the churches don’t have the time to counter academia’s teaching of personal truth. In other words, Jesus is their truth; Allah is the Muslim’s truth and so forth. This philosophy is condoned and promoted by not only academia, but the judicial system and the news media. “Tollerance” is the glue that holds this concept together. All truths are equal and if we try to raise our truth above others, we are intollerant and therefore—bigots. This, too, is tragic.

That is why we need more and more good Christian schools to raise that number so that the youth of today can accurately relate the Gospel to future generations.

We at Corfield Consulting Services, have dedicated our lives to helping Christian schools to learn how to raise needed funds for their all important ministries. I pray that all other consultanting agencies will view their missions with the same dedication and urgency. They are all needed; in fact, more are needed.

We can tell by the number of new clients signing on for feasibility studies and the number of inquiries that our services and ministries will be needed for quite a long time. I ask all of you to join with me in prayer, asking that The Lord will provide laborers to help meet the financial needs of His Christian schools.

We at Corfield Consulting Services pray too that all of you will have a great year in 2007.

Blessings,

John W. Corfield

President of CCS