Seaver Mission: Our Faculty

Community

Seaver College of Letters, Arts, and Sciences is a community of scholars within Pepperdine University sharing the ongoing process of intellectual discovery and personal growth. The faculty forms the nucleus of this community, and its interaction with students is the community's central activity. The Seaver faculty draws its strength from both its commonality and its diversity.

Commonality

Seaver faculty members share the following qualities and values:

Excellence and satisfaction as teachers of undergraduate students. Seaver's primary mission centers on its impact on students, especially undergraduate students. Seaver faculty members therefore strive to be excellent teachers – well-prepared, fair, enthusiastic, innovative, and constantly improving. The priority which they place on teaching can be seen in such things as the level of energy expended in preparing for instructional activities, creativity in using varied methods of instruction, and sensitivity to student needs and questions in and out of the classroom.

Thorough academic preparation. Seaver faculty members have acquired the highest appropriate degrees in their areas of teaching and research. This initial preparation becomes the basis for continued intellectual growth, active participation in professional organizations, and contributions to the disciplines of academic specialization.

Strength of character worthy of emulation. The ideal relationship between teacher and student at Seaver College is more than mere academic interaction; therefore, faculty members at Seaver seek to be role models as well as academicians. While this fact does not imply that faculty members lack the right to private lives beyond the confines of the college, it does call attention to the Seaver philosophy of educating the whole person and recognizing that such an education extends beyond the classroom. The faculty's strength of character, maturity, and ethical clarity are integral to the heritage it seeks to pass on to students.

An inquisitive spirit. The love of learning and a critical approach to knowledge are the beginning of scholarship. The Seaver faculty views learning and discovery as exciting and takes special joy in them. The faculty is in fact a community of life-long learners who have never stopped growing intellectually. Research at Seaver is not a sterile professional exercise but rather the natural fruit of an inquisitive spirit. Seaver faculty members often share their research with the wider scholarly community through publication or oral presentation, and the spirit that generated these discoveries is highly valued.

A devotion to Christian moral and ethical values based upon a personal spiritual commitment. Seaver College, as an independent, church-related institution, gathers scholars who are themselves unreservedly committed to such values and who discipline their own lives by them. A significant majority of faculty base their commitment to such values, and their daily lives, on a personal faith in Jesus Christ, and live out that faith in their churches and communities.

A sense of servant hood. One of the paramount Christian values is this: "Whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant." While it is the responsibility of the University to provide adequate support and compensation to the faculty, excellence in the respected serving professions comes from within. This fact influences the activities of the Seaver faculty within the University and results in service to the larger community through the religious, civic, political, social, and cultural life of the local communities in which faculty members live.

Diversity

The strength of the Seaver faculty consists not only in its commitment to shared values, but also in its diversity. This diversity broadens the students' horizons and contributes to an objective search for truth. The faculty exhibits a balance between age and youth, men and women, varied levels of experience, and differing rank and tenure status. Faculty members have varied undergraduate and graduate experiences, cultural and racial heritages, and areas of special interest and expertise. Individual faculty members excel in varying combinations of teaching, research, and service. The makeup of the faculty reflects the University's strong historic relationship to Churches of Christ while fully recognizing the valuable contributions of those who, while not members of Churches of Christ, complement and share a commitment to the mission of Seaver College.