When you are first starting your university system, instructor recruitment may seem like the hardest part of the job. Actually, it is. But it is not as hard as it seems.

Who do you want to be instructors at your university sessions? Laurels? Well, they are a logical choice. They must have some knowledge that they can share if they are members of the Order of the Laurel. You might also recruit from the other peerage orders: Your Pelicans and Royal Peers may be able to teach such diverse classes as courtesy, administration, SCA history classes, autocratting and feastocratting. Your Chivalry can teach armor building, tactics, and a number of martial pursuits.

You are going to need more instructors than just the Laurels. Unless your kingdom is really top-heavy in Laurels, they are going to burn out from teaching every session. You need to rotate your instructors to keep them from burning out. You also need to rotate your instructors so that you are continually offering new classes/information to the students. The members of these peerage orders can also usually recommend someone like an apprentice, or another person if they are unable to teach themselves at that particular session.

Other places to look for instructors? Who is teaching a class at various events? Who is teaching at the guild level? And let's not forget about the various kingdom great officers. Who does the Kingdom marshall think is qualified to teach polearm? Florentine? Talk to your group A&S Ministers. Who in their group is teaching or providing a great deal of help to other members of the group? Who is holding a cooking meeting on a regular basis? Who is brewing? Who is creating jewelry? Who has made some really wonderful period garb? Get these people to share their information as an instructor at your university session. Find out how your kingdom guilds (for example brewing, archery, etc.) are passing information along to other members of their guild. Perhaps they would like to teach a class at the university session. Try not to limit yourself to just those members of the various arts and sciences award levels in your kingdom.

Does your Kingdom produce a listing of teachers or judges? The Kingdom of An Tir publishes The An Tir Boke of Kivyne Talent, a Compendium of Teychers. This booklet is a directory of instructors who are willing to share their skills with others. The Kingdom of Calontir publishes a Judges Roster. This booklet lists those who have judged or are willing to judge in competitions. If your kingdom publishes a booklet of instructors or judges, try contacting the names of those who are listed. If someone is competent to judge something, it usually follows that they probably know enough about the subject to teach a class on it.

Who are some of the more popular members in your kingdom? Who always seems to have a crowd around them at events? If these people also have knowledge in an area, ask them to teach. Having popular members of the kingdom teaching will ensure that a certain portion of the populace will turn out to hear them speak.

Find out what kind of requests for information your Kingdom A&S Minister has been handling. Who have they recommended to answer certain questions or who have they gone to for help in answering questions? Get that resource person to teach.

In Atlantia, instructor recruitment happens by word of mouth for the most part. Sometimes in Altantia, a person will get together a whole track of theme classes, in which case that person can style themselves Dean of that particular college for that session. Formally, there is the College of St. Catherine (for women's studies), the College of Performing Arts, and the College of Heralds.

For the most part, people need to be asked. They either are very modest and honestly do not believe they would be acceptable as an instructor, or they just don't like to volunteer. Some people are just simply not the volunteering kind. They won't say no if asked, but they won't volunteer either. Then there are others who can't wait to be asked, but volunteer before you are even ready.

However you obtain your instructors, you should have a lot of them on tap. You may not use them every session (nor should you wear them out like that), but some instructors will not be able to travel very far, and others will travel to the far ends of the earth if asked.

The more instructors you have, the greater variety of classes/courses you can offer at your university sessions. Some instructors will be qualified to teach in multiple subject areas, others can only handle one subject/multiple classes or just one class. If you are constantly changing your offerings, you will have a better chance of members attending more than one session.

You also want to have lots of instructors so that your instructors are not burdened with spending the entire session teaching. They should have some time between classes to prepare for their next class if they are teaching more than one, and also have some time to take some classes. Many instructors enjoy the chance to learn something new as well as share their knowledge.

For each session, ideally you should try for a mix of out-of-campus and in-campus instructors. This way, information can be spread to those members of the populace who do not travel outside their campus, plus outside instructors, their family members and/or entourages, and those members from other campuses who like to travel, will be able to learn something from instructors who generally do not travel outside their campus.

Last Modified: 11/19/98

Please send your comments to: Kateryn de Develyn

Instructor Recruitment