Ted & Juli Kautzmann...with the Latin America Training Network
November 2004

Dear Friends,

We have a hidden agenda. Well, it’s not actually hidden, but it’s not the first thing we talk about when we tell people what we’re here for. Yes, we are offering our own program of leadership training. But we also want to change the way most other evangelical schools in the region train people too. This is huge. There are dozens of pretty good seminaries and institutes scattered across Latin America. The problem is they reach less than 10% of the leaders that need the training. One answer is for those schools to offer their courses over the Internet in addition to their traditional program. Six years ago most school deans and professors doubted that online courses could be effective. Our overtures were met with polite skepticism. No more.

Two weeks ago I was in Peru at a meeting of an association of theological schools of Latin America, called AETAL. Educators came from seven countries. My purpose was to represent LATN, build credibility for our online courses, and make contacts. I also gave workshops on how to design on-line courses. Interest was very high. More people signed up for these workshops than any others offered. Skepticism has largely dissolved. Seminary leaders now know it can work and most want their schools to start online programs. One seminary president told me his school was located high in the Andes where pastors are very poor and travel is slow. Many pastors would love to study at his school but cannot do so because a commute from their villages would be too long. But they could study over the Internet! He’s eager to get an online program started. I heard the same from school deans working in huge cities, small towns and even the jungle. AETAL officials are eager for us to begin offering assistance in this area to their member schools. This is the opening we hoped for. We just didn’t think it would happen this soon!

Tomorrow we begin holding meetings here in Costa Rica to explore establishing a new alliance. We’ve invited three seminaries to send representatives from Colombia, Guatemala and Costa Rica. Those seminaries are beginning or planning their own online programs but feel they can’t do it alone. We want to work together with them so that we can swap courses and lighten each others’ load. For this purpose it is important that we use the same approach and the same formats for our courses. We have also invited MAF (Mission Aviation Fellowship), which now has a whole division dedicated to providing learning technologies to other missions and ministries in the developing world. They could lighten our load in the areas of computer hardware and software. Please pray that these meetings will lead to agreements between us, MAF and the other seminaries.

Developing these relationships has occupied much of Ted’s time in recent months. But the payoff could be huge. We’re hoping that our influence and relationships will result in a whole network of cooperating schools that will produce many more courses.

At home, James is doing a little better at school. Juli is going to the school everyday to help work with him. Though his dyslexia makes learning a challenge, he seems to be making progress. Sam is pretty homesick as a college freshman in Africa, though he’s getting along okay. One hardship is that he has to cook for himself in a dorm without access to a refrigerator and he can only go to a store on weekends. They’ve been without water on and off, so sometimes he has to carry buckets about a half mile to his dorm. He will finish this semester, and then probably come back to Costa Rica. Sarah and Jojo are doing great. Last week Juli had a squeaky clean blood test report! There’s been no sign of cancer for 3 years now.

Please Pray for:
1. Solid progress in our partner seminaries’ development of online courses 
2. Ted’s trip to Brazil in late November to teach and to talk about partnering with a Free Church seminary 
there. 
3. Sam, relief from homesickness and for friends and positive learning experiences in Africa. 
4. James, accelerated progress in learning, and no more panic attacks 
5. Our church, which has been seeking a pastor for nearly two years and is in decline. I’m on the search committee--it’s not easy.
6. Strengthened monthly support.

Thank you so much for your partnership with us. I apologize for the long delay in sending you this update. You deserve better. The next will come soon.