LSTC Announces New Leadership Initiative

The Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago is pleased to announce the Leadership Initiative (LI), a new opportunity for the institution to provide theologically based leadership training for LSTC students, alumni, nonprofit leaders, and community partners.

The objective for this training is to prepare participants for leadership roles, both personal and organizational, in a variety of contexts. The LI’s aim is to transform organizations, improve efficiency, support value creation, and activate those they serve. Leadership training through this initiative will encourage participants to find new, innovative ways of developing and managing people, promote new opportunities, and address issues facing their organization or congregation.

The Leadership Initiative will be directed by the Damm Chair in Leadership, established 2018, to which a highly qualified individual will be appointed in Summer 2023. In the first year, the Chair will begin teaching courses at the master’s level of the Public Church curriculum, including introductory courses in pastoral, diaconal, and other forms of leadership and advanced courses on leadership topics. 

The holder of the Damm Chair will also teach graduate courses, including advanced seminars in our strongly international and ecumenical DMin. programs. Also in the first year of the LI, the Chair will begin work to integrate a theological and scriptural basis for leadership into broader curricular and cocurricular formation across the seminar. This work will continue and be further developed in the long-term. 

The development of the LSTC Leadership Initiative and forthcoming programmatic support reflects the institution’s commitment to interfaith relations; contextually engaged ministry; Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Justice; intersectional, cross-cultural and intercultural competency building, policy development, and collaboration.