Two practitioners share the ins and outs of doing CCD in rural America
[In this two part series], we ask two rural CCD practitioners—Rev. Tim Olsen of South Dakota and Pat Vander Pol of Iowa—about their ministries, their areas, and about living out the 3R’s. We also posed the ultimate question: ‘What’s different about doing Christian Community Development in a rural setting?’ Here’s Part One.Summit House offers a sweet opportunity for ten students at Sioux Falls Seminary to receive a first-hand urban ministry experience in the restoration of rural Pettigrew Heights [pop. 4,000]. Rev. Tim Olsen has been the enthusiastic director of Summit House for the past year. Students from the seminary live and learn together at the House while they serve the felt-needs of their underserved neighborhood. Sioux Falls is also one of few seminaries that offer a Master’s degree program in Christian Community Development www.sfseminary.edu. Tim attended his first CCDA conference in 2009, and will host a CCDA Café in Sioux Falls in April 2010.
‘A Growing Place’ is a successful urban garden planted at Lowell MST elementary school in Pettigrew Heights, South Dakota
Two practitioners share the ins and outs of doing CCD in rural America
[In this two part series], we ask two rural CCD practitioners—Rev. Tim Olsen of South Dakota and Pat Vander Pol of Iowa—about their ministries, their areas, and about living out the 3R’s. We also posed the ultimate question: ‘What’s different about doing Christian Community Development in a rural setting?’ Here’s Part One.Summit House offers a sweet opportunity for ten students at Sioux Falls Seminary to receive a first-hand urban ministry experience in the restoration of rural Pettigrew Heights [pop. 4,000]. Rev. Tim Olsen has been the enthusiastic director of Summit House for the past year. Students from the seminary live and learn together at the House while they serve the felt-needs of their underserved neighborhood. Sioux Falls is also one of few seminaries that offer a Master’s degree program in Christian Community Development www.sfseminary.edu. Tim attended his first CCDA conference in 2009, and will host a CCDA Café in Sioux Falls in April 2010.
Q: Tell us about Pettigrew Heights, where the Summit House is located.
Tim: It is the first of fourteen neighborhoods targeted by the city of Sioux Falls for nurturing and revitalization. Thirty-five percent of Pettigrew Heights is Native American, African, African-American, and Spanish. We have some gang activity, drug traffic, and prostitution. There is a high percentage of renters/tenants, so that’s one reason that there’s also high mobility. Some of the Native American students at Lowell MST Elementary, the school we work with in Pettigrew Heights, will attend school for two months, then disappear back to the reservation and come back for another two months.
Q: How did the Sioux Falls Seminary get involved in doing CCD in that neighborhood?
I was inspired toward Christian Community Development by Dr. Jay Moon, a professor at the seminary’s Intercultural Studies program. He spent nine years in Africa planting churches. Summit House grew out of his imagination. Lowell Elementary in Pettigrew Heights (400 students) is the only math, science, and technology school in the city. We ran a summer agriculture program via a seminary grad with a background in that field. Parents showed up just to see what was going on, and conversations ensued. We started doing ‘urban agriculture’ using a teaching garden we began at the elementary school, and it has bred a sense of ownership in both students and parents. The local Kiwanis club provided flowerbeds and a greenhouse is soon going in. Teachers have their students very active in the garden and the school is considering a full year curriculum in urban agriculture. Members of the local PTA, local government, a liberal arts college, city government officials, and others came together to have this conversation now called the Urban Agriculture Task Force. Other schools want an urban garden at their schools now.
Q: You mention in the video on your website that the students living at Summit House didn’t come into Pettigrew Heights with answers, but with questions. ‘Listening’ is a key CCDA principle for community empowerment. Tell us how that plays out in your area.
We talk often about how to build mutual trust and respect. Our Summit house students do this so well.
When we went to the elementary school, I told them, ‘We just want to listen.’ One woman said, ‘Thank you. Everyone else wants to come in and ‘fix’ us.’
I’m the middle class white guy who ‘has all the answers,’ so I had to unlearn that mindset, too. We just want to help them discover the resources that are already in the community. We are asking, ‘How does this lend itself to entrepreneurship and other opportunities? We want to give it away and have the community take it over. We’ve recently seen longtime residents and homeowners who raised children there “watching” us. They’re probably asking, ‘Is this going to be a cutesy fad, or will it be long term?’ We had to prove first that we can be trusted, and that we’re not just talking but doing something. Now those people are coming forward and getting into the conversation. Some of the people from Pettigrew Heights have shown interest in leading the urban agriculture program. [For more on the importance of ‘Listening’ in CCD work, check out the Empowerment Toolkit available at ccda.org]
Q: Sioux Falls offers one of few Master’s degrees in Christian Community Development. Tell us about it and how it came about.
It’s a two-year Master’s degree in Christian Leadership with a specialization in Christian Community Development. There is also a certification in CCD, which is less intense and can be added on to an M. Div. or other Master’s degree. The program is one-year old. It came out of living and working in Pettigrew Heights, listening to churches who are watching what we are doing, and want to know, ‘How do we get outside the walls of our congregation?’
We asked ourselves, ‘Can our seminary be the one that bridges the gap by providing students that have the heart of a missionary, the soul of a theologian and the hands and feet of a community organizer?’
This skill set prepares students if they go into non profit work, the business world or into church leadership. Most seminaries require a supervised ministry experience, so this fits into that, and they get credit for working in the neighborhood. We are now saying to other congregations out of the Sioux Falls area that are interested in CCD, ‘If you can find five people who will commit, they can receive a certificate in CCD through distance learning.’
Q: How has this first group of seminary students responded to the experience?
Many of our Summit House residents came to seminary thinking they would get a Master’s degree here and then work in local church leadership. Now that they’ve experienced Christian Community Development, they’re not so sure. They are having a shift in their thinking. We believe that the best CCD is church based, but I think we have a whole generation of twenty and thirty-something’s who aren’t satisfied with sitting in a pew or a chair on a Sunday morning for ‘an event.’ They read the gospel and want to know, ‘How can we do that?’ ‘How can we look at both the spiritual and physical aspects of a human being?’ CCD brings a holistic view to this.
Q: What’s different for you in doing CCD in a small town or rural area?
People think we don’t have the same problems as in a large city, but we do. We don’t always have the resources to collect the people that are interested and passionate about CCD. I grew up on a farm in Minnesota and spent most of my career in a rural area. There are people there that are restless and know there are challenges, but don’t now how to meet them. I have a heart for that. We want to prepare those people to discover the solutions to their own challenges. Some of the churches in the wealthier suburbs here have an interest in Pettigrew Heights. We’re saying, ‘You can come in for awhile,’ but we’re asking them take what they learn here and do some qualitative studies to see where the needs are in their own neighborhood—to see what justice looks like in the ‘burbs. Spiritual and emotional poverty exists too.
Q: You plan to host a CCDA Café in April and possibly a two-day [Intensive] in October. Who do you hope to attract?
We want to attract a variety of students from our seminary and other liberal arts colleges, pastors, non profit leaders, local government—we’re hoping for a grand mixture of people at the café. Even an international youth ministry may attend. And we’re excited that the seminary is willing to go out to find financial backing to host the Institute in the fall. I attended Bob Lupton’s session at an Institute in Cedar Falls, Iowa. Many people there represented small rural towns. There are people in small cities that are also ready. I think there’s a huge mission field in that area.
Q: Last year’s Cinci conference was your first one. What impacted you the most?
Tim: The workshops on Empowerment are really the ones that impact all areas of CCD, so for me it was an ‘Aha!’ moment attending Mary Nelson’s presentation. One of our students, a young woman, went to an affordable housing workshop and began to understand the concept of jubilee. She was dancing on cloud nine after that, saying, ‘Now I know what God is calling me to do!’ Her thesis will now revolve around the concepts she learned in that workshop. Other students went on the day-trip to Kentucky and came back filled with new thoughts. They are the pioneers. Having a booth at the conference to promote our seminary gave me a chance to interact with practitioners and find out where they see gaps in their own training and how we might fill those. To see the different ages and cultures at the conference in conversation is a sign and a foretaste of the Kingdom of God.
