Several members of the educational task force met to discuss educational matters such as Feast lessons for children, Sabbath school programs, young adult educational tours, focused education plans, an online education pilot and a new perspective on our task force.

Gary Antion, coordinator of educational programs, chaired the teleconference and began with re-focusing on the goals and aims of the task force. The task force is composed of educators and promoters. The members are Scott and Michelle Delamater, John Karlik, Jim and Sue Kocher, Randy and Kay Schreiber, Arthur and Marsha Suckling, Keith and Christy Tomes and Julie Zutz. All of them are enthusiastic about education for the church. We discussed the need for follow-through in making sure that the program decisions are carried out by the administrative personnel. We will more diligently try to get feedback on the various projects that are recommended to be implemented.

The main discussion was about how to move on the Feast lessons for young children, kindergarten age through grade five. We also want to put out sermonette material or a DVD explaining how parents may teach their children about God’s Holy Days. We all agreed that parents are the ones to teach their children about the meaning of the Feasts, but we have also had several individuals write and ask about having some classes for the young people at the Feast so that they may learn with other children about God’s Way and Holy Days and have interaction with other youths. We are hopeful of moving this along. Julie Zutz and Kay Schreiber will support this project with input from Keith Tomes.

Other past projects were brought up that have not been completed, and we plan to work on them as well. Marriage seminars, women’s retreats, special seminars at the Feasts, Feast Bible studies and General Conference of Elders poster sessions were also briefly mentioned.

We want to be actively moving educational issues forward.

In all, it was a refreshing new beginning for the education task force with product to follow.

We are thankful for those on the task force for taking the time out of their schedules to meet and plan to serve the church through education programs.

We would encourage parents to download material from our website at http://members.ucg.org/content/festival-work-booklets to help their children focus on the meaning of the Feast of Tabernacles this year.