PLANNING

The heart of CVSOM is to be a "Valley School for Valley Churches". While students of the school are our focus, our "Clients", the people we are trying to serve, are local church pastors and ministry leaders. The desperate need for quality leaders (at all levels of ministry) is present in nearly every church or Christian organization in the Central Valley. This is especially true in smaller churches, new church plants, and community ministry start-ups. We see CVSOM as a vital partner in helping churches and ministries identify and train people God has called to lead in His church.

Over the next 20 years, it is our desire to partner with local churches to see one thousand people enter into fruitful and vibrant ministry right here in our Valley as a result of CVSOM. We believe that hundreds of those will become high-level leaders in their churches or ministries and that dozens of new ministries will be born out of their leadership.

Re-establish and Reconnect

In 2022-2023 our goal is to re-establish CVSOM in our community as a resource for local, affordable, accessible, and quality, Christian ministry education for local church pastors. Re-connecting with churches that have graduated students in the past and forging new relationships with those who have not yet sent students through the school.

Expanding Beyond the Core Program

At the core of CVSOM is the 9-Month Christian Ministry Certificate Program. While this will remain our flagship focus the school has much more it can offer our local churches in the form of education. There is a series of weekend seminars that are a required part of the Certificate Program that we would like to make available to churches for their people to attend as an individual class.

• Biblical Interpretation: How to study your bible focusing on observation, interpretation, correlation, and application.
• Seeing the World With Hebrew Eyes: Where the “Jewishness” of the Bible is proposed as essential to proper biblical interpretation.
• The Book of Revelation: Understanding its purpose in its original context and setting.
• Word & Spirit: Teaching the truth of scripture accurately, and in harmony with the Holy Spirit, who inspires and speaks to believers today.
• Maintaining Sound Doctrine: Examining the essential truths of the Christian faith and how to identify and deal with false teaching.
• And More Under Development

Satellite Expansion

In the past, CVSOM has successfully hosted satellite locations of the school in other cities up and down the Central Valley. We would like to leverage new technologies to re-establish these satellite locations expanding the circle of churches we can serve.

Perspectives Class Expansion

There is an opportunity for CVSOM to host Perspectives. Perspectives is a fifteen-week education course exploring different aspects of God’s global purpose. The course examines the story of God fulfilling His promises from four vantage points or “perspectives”— Biblical, Historical, Cultural, and Strategic. This a powerful program that is designed to help people identify and take their next steps into mission work both global and local. We see this being an easy addition CVSOM that would be a great blessing to the church, not just here in the Valley but across the globe.

Continuing Education

In addition to serving the needs of pastors with leadership development, we would like to offer continuing education for pastors and church leaders to strengthen their leadership and teaching skills.

There are multiple ways that CVSOM can be sustained financially as an organization.

Minimum Tuition - Basic Operation

The school has historically supported itself with tuition from a minimum of 20 students enrolled in the 9 -month Christian Ministry Certificate Program, all admin tasks being performed by volunteers, and space for the school provided by a local church. While technically sustainable, it is far from ideal. For the school to grow and new students to be recruited for the next year's program more than volunteers and minimum student levels will be required.

Complete Class - Full Operation

With the ideal enrollment of 30 students in the 9 -month Christian Ministry Certificate Program the school can sustain basic operations as well as the 2 stipend positions of Admin and Registrar. These two roles enable the school to function well and continue to reach out to local pastors and churches to recruit new students.

Expansion - Satellite Operation

When the school is able to invest in the technology and infrastructure to extend classes to satellite church locations the potential to double or triple the school's enrollment is possible without a significant increase in overhead. This would enable the school to increase the Admin and Registrar roles from stipend positions to part-time paid positions.

Scholarships Funds

100% of scholarship funds go directly towards the tuition of students enrolled in the school. They help the school by increasing enrollment (up to our max class size of 30) but they do not contribute to the development or expansion of CVSOM.

Outside Funding

The school is designed to be financially self-sustaining and has functioned with minimal outside funding since 2005. In the past, the focus of the school was primarily on providing the lowest possible cost to students. As a result, the school lost sight of the need for continued development and promotion of the program to keep it healthy and growing. Today, we maintain the value of providing the highest level of education at the lowest possible cost but we also recognize that doing so requires that we seek out additional funding from outside sources to develop and expand the school's programs. Foundation giving, grants, endowments, and donations, all go toward these vital growth functions.

The world is changing at a break-neck pace. Issues that just a few years ago seemed like isolated cases and fringe culture are now front and center in our everyday life. How do we, as church leaders apply the truth of scripture to these new circumstances in ways that accurately reflect the heart of Jesus? How do we lead our people in righteousness and truth into a lost and dying world that needs the light and love of Jesus?

In addition to our 9-Month Ministry Certificate Program, we plan to develop classes, seminars, workshops, and forums, for local pastors, ministry leaders, and alumni to help them keep pace with our ever-changing culture.