Discipleship College in flux

The Catholic Discipleship College has not received any applications at all for its 2019 programme, forcing it to suspend operations this year.
In a letter to its supporters, CDC Board of Trustees chairman Bruce Fraser-Jones said it is crucial to have six to 10 students to run and staff the nine-month programme.

“Because living in community is a cornerstone of the CDC experience for students, the Board of Trustees have therefore decided to suspend the programme this year and implement a communications and marketing strategy to source enough applications to run the programme again in 2020,” he said.

“The board has taken learnings from this set of events and its clear focus this year will be the continued administration of the trust, as well as intensively marketing CDC and preparing the 2020 programme in order to attract well-qualified students next year,” Mr Fraser-Jones added.

He said this also forced the board to make current staff positions redundant.

“It is timely to sincerely acknowledge the significant contributions of Cameron Surrey, supported by his wife Cheryl, as household leader over the last four years. They have worked diligently over this time to bring CDC to what it is today,” he said.

The CDC chairman also thanked Fr Dominic Faure for his [Fr Faure’s] support of both CDC and Dr Surrey. He also said Sarah Rumble stays on as administration and
liaison person for the college.

Mr Fraser-Jones said the trustees “strongly believe in the spiritual meaning and value of our programme”.

“To be clear this is not the end, but simply a new beginning,” he said.

He asked CDC supporters to continue supporting the college through donations and prayers.

“You would be helping immensely if you could introduce the 2020 programme to at least one young adult to discern and consider a year at CDC and the potential it could hold for them,” he said.

Mr Fraser-Jones said they know from experience that the best candidates for the programme are promising young people who are personally recommended to the college.

“It is the marked spiritual benefit we know past students have derived from their time at CDC that inspires us to determinedly promote the CDC programme,” he said.