Starting with the belief that God is the source of all truth, education becomes the exciting adventure of seeking to appropriate knowledge in all its various facets under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.”

These are the opening words of The Foundational Concepts of Christian Education, the document that states the educational purpose and philosophy of Geneva College. Rooted in the belief that God’s truth is the starting point for knowledge, Geneva makes faith the center of all areas of life and learning. But when The Foundational Concepts were written in the 1960s, the college didn’t have the clear identity it does today.

“Geneva is known in the Christian community now in a way that it wasn’t in the ’40s and ’50s,” says Jean (Linton ’43) Hemphill, who served on the committee that drafted The Foundational Concepts. “You wouldn’t recognize the college in my day at all. The thing that distinguished it as a Christian college was simply that the rules and regulations on campus were based on biblical principles.”

Since its arrival in Beaver Falls in 1880, Geneva had been the only college in the area. “Geneva’s emphasis was not nearly as much on focusing to get Christian students as it was on getting students from the community,” Hemphill says. But beginning in the 1950s, Geneva met with some competition. The University of Pittsburgh dramatically reduced the cost of tuition. Later, Penn State University opened a branch campus in Beaver County. The newly founded Community College of Beaver County offered career training at a much lower cost, and Geneva was forced to examine what it had to offer that other institutions didn’t.

“Private school education costs more than a public education, so it has to have something important to make parents spend the extra money,” Hemphill says. It was time for Geneva to revisit its roots. “We had to appeal to the Christian community.”

Meanwhile, several factors were setting the stage for a renewal of Geneva’s Christian commitment. In the years following World War II, Geneva had experienced rapid growth. The college purchased more property to accommodate the influx of students, constructed new buildings and hired more faculty. However, in the midst of this expansion, the college began to lose sight of its foundational purpose.

“But in God’s providence, it was Geneva’s desire to improve the physical that led to the improvement of the spiritual,” says professor and president emeritus Dr. John H. White. Geneva needed new residence halls, a student center, athletic facilities and upgrades to its science building. In order to pay for these improvements, the college needed funding and approached the Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America for more financial help. An institution of the RP Church since its founding in 1848, Geneva has operated under a level of direct oversight that is extremely rare in the world of Christian higher education today. But by the 1950s, the college had drifted from the mission of its founders, and the denomination had questions about the depth of Geneva’s Christian commitment. That concern was echoed by the Middle States Association, an organization that accredits regional colleges and universities. After an extensive evaluation, the committee found that although the college was struggling from a lack of funds and increase in competition, its real problem lay in a lack of purpose.

It was time for a change, but Geneva had a president who was ready for it. “I am firmly convinced that the educational program which Geneva offers must be basically and essentially Christian in character, primarily liberal arts in nature, and excellent in quality,” said Dr. Edwin C. Clarke in his inaugural address in 1957.

In the early 1960s, Geneva’s board of trustees asked the board of corporators (which provided church oversight) for a major contribution. The corporators granted their request, but in 1964 asked that a joint committee, made up of members of both boards, be appointed to “study in depth the problems of implementing the distinctively Christian witness and character of Geneva College and to make recommendations for developing this witness and character to its fullest degree.”

The corporators were represented by Jack White, James D. Carson, Kenneth G. Smith, and Paul D. McCracken (all RP ministers); and the trustees by J. Merrill Robb, Jean L. Hemphill and J. Renwick Patterson. “The joint committee set out to define a philosophy of Christian higher education that would clearly express the idea of Geneva,” says White. As the committee worked to draft the document, they realized they were defining Christian education in a way that had not previously been articulated in the church at large. “The concept of Christianity as being a Christian in every area of life, and as studying every subject from a Christian point of view, was a difficult bridge to get over,” Carson says.

Dr. Johannes G. Vos, a professor in Geneva’s Bible department, believed in the power of Christ-centered learning. In his pamphlet entitled “What is Christian Education?” he provided the vision the joint committee had been searching for:

“The tragedy is that even many who no doubt are born-again Christians fail to see the implications of Christianity for life as a whole.…We must not limit Christian education to religion. For if we do that we will fail to glorify God in all of life and knowledge. There must be a Christian view of history and economics and politics and physics, as well as a Christian view of salvation and the religious life. God is God everywhere or He is God nowhere.…By Christian education we do not mean secular education with Christian features added on externally; Christian education means education that is Christian in its essence or inner character all along the line, not only in the chapel and Bible classroom, but in every classroom and every laboratory, as well as in the life and thinking of every teacher.”

“According to Vos, our entire way of looking at the world cannot be proved,” says Smith. “We start from a totally different point of view—you can’t demonstrate it scientifically. But it’s not a blind faith, it’s an educated faith.”

With Vos’s help, the joint committee presented the first draft of The Foundational Concepts to the boards, faculty and administration of Geneva College. They liked the direction. More drafts were circulated and discussed, and the document was finally adopted by the RPCNA and Geneva’s board of trustees in 1967.

As President Clarke put The Foundational Concepts into action, change came gradually but reshaped the entire campus and curriculum.

“The Foundational Concepts affected the faculty and the hiring of personnel. It affected the humanities—the whole department was an outgrowth of that,” Hemphill says. “The faculty was talking about it, Dr. Clarke was faithful to encourage it, and it was becoming a part of the college community.”

The most radical change of all was perhaps that faculty members were now required to know and understand their fields from a Christian perspective. This complete integration of faith and learning defined in The Foundational Concepts was a new concept for the faculty, some of whom were not professing Christians. But President Clarke wasn’t trying to impose a whole new system on the faculty. Instead, he wanted to involve them in bringing Geneva in line with its overarching purpose.

“They not only saw the document and reviewed it, they made contributions to it,” Carson says. “They participated—they weren’t just told what it was supposed to be.”

There were also changes in the student body. With the reevaluation of Geneva’s mission, in and out of the classroom, the structure of residence life changed dramatically. Where house mothers had previously overseen students in the dorms, residence directors (RDs) were put in place. Closer in age to students and living in community with them, RDs were able to take an active role in the academic, personal and spiritual lives of students.

“This is not just a method, it’s a whole way of thinking,” Carson says, “and it marks us as Christians in the world today.”

Over the years, Geneva has continued to grow in this commitment to faith-and-learning integration. A full-time counselor has recently been hired to bolster student counseling with a decidedly biblical perspective. Bible professor Dr. Byron Curtis and a team of fellow faculty members are working to determine the implications of The Westminster Confession of Faith on the higher education project. Guest speakers are frequently invited to engage the campus in culturally relevant topics, and Geneva’s Center for Faith and Practice works with students to bring faith into every aspect of life.

With biblical truth as their starting point, Geneva College students now grow intellectually, personally and spiritually. Education forms a foundation for the rest of their lives, allowing them to explore the depth of God’s call as they use their gifts to build His kingdom. The Foundational Concepts have transformed the mission of the college, and Hemphill hopes to see this process continue, both in scholarship and faith.

“I want to see students receiving a well-rounded education with Christ at the center of all learning. But education is more than book learning. I’d like to see students going out into the world and making a difference in whatever field of service they are in.”

“That’s what makes this campus so exciting,” Smith agrees. “If these students get this, they’ll continue to make a difference wherever they go.”

—Jenny (Bower) Pichura graduated from Geneva College in 2005 and now works in the public relations office. She and her husband, Mike, are members of the College Hill (Beaver Falls, Pa.) RPC.