IWU’s School of Service and Leadership (SSL) is a school that honors its name. From Christian Ministry Leadership to Criminal Justice to Public Administration, SSL helps you pursue your calling to lead and serve others. Their secret: From the foundation up, they care.
The School of Service and Leadership teaches the value of servant leadership in all areas of life. Being a servant leader means lifting others up through service and putting others needs above your own. Servant leaders focus on those around them instead of themselves. Through this leadership style, they help build future leaders that can use the servant leadership approach.
While traditional leadership tends to follow a formal authority approach, servant leaders encourage taking a step down and putting someone else above you. A servant leader focuses on finding ways to serve those around them in order to make everyone successful. For example, servant leaders create a culture that encourages supporting a new team member in order to boost the entire team morale.
Dr. Mark Rennaker is the chair of the Department of Leadership Studies in SSL. Rennaker says the best thing about the school is the people he works with. “It seems crucial to us to serve each other well if we are going to lead a school of service and leadership.”
Service and leadership are important traits in someone practicing servant leadership. A few more characteristics of servant leadership are generosity, hospitality, and a genuine desire to see others find success. You can employ servant leadership in any area of your life. The servant leadership style of leadership will be an effective way to show others you truly care and provide authentic leadership that impacts those around you.
Collectively, the school works to create an environment among administrators, faculty, and students with three crucial value statements:
“Our school vision can be captured as, ‘The school of service and leadership seeks to empower graduates to do what Christ calls all His followers to do: serve others with humility, grace, and compassion,’” Rennaker says.
Certainly, students join an academic program because they want to become qualified for a job or move up within their career. However, Rennaker says the common threads across SSL – helping, serving, and leading – suggest that students think not just about career, but their calling. “Our programs invest in students and give them the opportunity to explore their calling, gifting, and passions so they are better able to put those into practice.”
According to Dr. Rennaker, IWU SSL stands out from other universities’ programs in two distinct ways:
Today, SSL alumni thrive in their communities as social workers, administrators, pastors, teachers, presidents, CEOs, partners, professors, chairs, and more. Although their roles are diverse, they have one thing in common: They want to live a life of meaning and significance by investing themselves in the good of others.
Are you passionate about living a life of service? If the SSL mission resonates with you, consider advancing your education through one of our programs.
