MTR in the Commercial Appeal

The day of graduation, The Commercial Appeal printed an article in the Faith in Memphis section about the MTR. David Waters has written about Neighborhood Church, and was present when David came to NC to share more about the vision of MTR. He interviewed me along with David and Robin to write this article.

Here are a few exerpts:

Virginia Boyd wants to serve God and Memphis by becoming the best math teacher any city school kid has ever had.

David Montague and Robin Scott want to serve God and Memphis by helping Virginia do that.

"You don't have to talk about the love and compassion and mercy of Christ to demonstrate it," said Montague, a former stockbroker turned public school evangelist. "Becoming the best math teacher a kid's ever had is a valid response to the gospel."

Montague and Scott are leading the Memphis Teacher Residency, one of many nonprofit organizations that have responded to the Gates Foundation's $90-million challenge to put an effective teacher in every Memphis City Schools classroom.

Like Teach for America and the Memphis Teaching Fellows, MTR seeks to recruit, train and support outstanding urban educators in Memphis. What makes MTR different is its mission to do that "within a Christian context."

MTR's "Christian context" comes in the motivation, not the implementation.

"It's a shared mission, that's the heart of it," said Scott, a former Indiana public school teacher and MTR's director of education. Teaching in large, urban systems "is too hard, too demanding not to have a sense of mission about it," Scott said. "You have to see urban education as a calling."

MTR recruits and accepts only candidates who believe that teaching in large, urban public schools systems is a Christian calling, not just a career. But candidates also must believe they should not discuss their faith in a public school setting.

"America is not short on information about the gospel," said Montague, a former Christian missionary who directs MTR's work from offices in the basement of Union Avenue Baptist Church. "It is short on demonstrations of the power of the gospel."

....

"So far, we can't prove that MTR has any value whatsoever, but I swear I believe what I'm about to say," Montague said.

"What's happening in Memphis City Schools is the greatest opportunity to bring glory to God since Jesus Christ was raised from the dead. Everyone really is watching Memphis. The president is watching. Bill and Melinda Gates are watching. The whole nation is watching.

"I believe the MTR has this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to transform education one school and one feeder pattern at a time. And in doing so, we have the opportunity and potential to transform and redeem public education in Memphis for God's glory. We have the opportunity to do the impossible, and by doing so, prove that God is real and powerful and faithful to His promises to those in need.

"And the whole world will know of it."