Damia: Today I have a special guest, one of my favorite Institute teachers, Brother Bennett. Welcome.
Brother Bennett: Welcome, thanks. Glad to be here.
Damia: Okay, so we’ll just jump right into the questions and interview for today. Let’s just start by telling us a little bit about yourself, Brother Bennett.
Brother Bennett: Sure. I grew up in Henderson, Nevada. It’s kind of the Las Vegas area. I grew up in a family of seven boys. I’ve always been a member of the Church. I served a mission in Chicago, Illinois, and married this wonderful woman named Mindy from Heber, Utah. And we have just had a lot of fun trying to raise a family and create a marriage that lasts and is wonderful. That’s just a little bit about me.
Damia: Thank you so much. So you are an institute teacher and a seminary teacher. Why don’t you tell us a little bit about the broader view of what your career is doing that?
Brother Bennett: Sure. So there’s lots of different positions in seminaries and institutes. Where I live in California, they don’t have release time seminary. So I’m what they call a coordinator. I help train called seminary teachers, and then I run several Institute programs, and I also help with the online pathway classes, and the Institute part of it. So there’s lots of actual variety in the different type of jobs you can do in religious education. It’s really cool.
Damia: And how long have you been doing this for?
Brother Bennett: Let’s see, it’s been… 17 years now, so 18 here in June, so it’ll be fun.
Damia: Wow, that’s awesome. How did you decide to go into that field to become an institute teacher, institute director?
Brother Bennett: You know, it wasn’t my original intention. I started out getting ready to be a fireman. I had been done the Explorer program in my hometown of Henderson. When I went to college, I got an English degree, but I also got my paramedic license and a few other things to kind of help me. It was a good springboard to helping me get ready to be a fireman. It was, it translated well.
And so I was working on that. And my last year of school, I was attending an institute class and I had a prompting to look into teaching seminaries and institutes. And that threw me for a loop, but I said, well, I’ll do it. And boy, I started the process of that and I fell in love with the job and thought, “if they’ll hire me, I would love to do this.” And I was fortunate enough to be hired and I’ve loved my career since.
Damia: Well, personally, I’m very grateful that you became an Institute teacher because honestly, you have been one of my favorite Institute teachers.
And I can just see your passion for the gospel, your testimony and all of that. So I think starting out taking your Institute classes really helped me to love Institute and to grow in my love for the gospel.
So thank you for following that prompting.
Brother Bennett: Very kind of you. Yeah, thanks, Damia.
Damia: What does a day typically look like for you? At work.
Brother Bennett: That’s a funny question. As a coordinator, it’s an interesting schedule. So you’ll often have early morning things that you do with the seminary. And then in the middle of the day, sometimes you’ll have day classes that you’ll get to be a part of with students at an institute program or online, which in my case, most of mine are online now.
And then I do, then you have kind of an open time. And then I usually work in the evenings, two or three days a week. So it’s a very scattered schedule that way, but I love it.
Damia: Great. Okay. What’s the salary range like? I have no idea what that could even be.
Brother Bennett: No, that’s a good question. I think it’s actually pretty good compensation. I think sometimes there’s almost a misnomer out there that if you teach in seminaries and institutes, you’re going to be poor. You’re not rich, but you have enough. You can have a family, you can support a family with it. Depending on if you go on and further your ability to teach and to administer, they’ll compensate you for that too. If you were to go on and get your master’s or your doctorate or get a certificate in, I don’t know, educational design or things along those lines, it’ll help to improve the compensation that you receive.
Damia: What has motivated you to stay in your career?
Brother Bennett: Oh, I love it. Probably the best part of it is getting to see the atonement of Jesus Christ work in people’s lives. For me, I’d do that for free. But the demands of the job make it so that it’s not something that you could do for free and still make a living, right? And still live. But it’s incredible to see the Lord’s hand in people’s lives.
Sometimes you get to play a small role in it, but most of the time I feel like I’m just watching as students and good youth and young adults make these decisions and see how the Lord’s building them and strengthening them. It’s awesome to be a part of.
Damia: That is awesome. So you mentioned a little bit of what your education path looked like. Once you decided that your next step was to become an institute teacher and seminary teacher, what did your education path look like and what education was required for you?
Brother Bennett: Good question. In order to be a full-time religious educator, you have to have a bachelor’s degree. And they’re actually not real picky on what your bachelor’s degree is in. Simply because they think that lots of variety can actually be helpful because the students that we work with will have lots of different interests. And so it’s a good thing to have a variety of bachelor degrees. After that, they’ll actually help you get a master’s degree. They want you to continue your education. And so they’ll help you help pay for your master’s degree. And my case, that was awesome.
I was able to go and get, they call it a Masters of Religious Education at BYU. It’s a small program, pretty competitive to get into it, but a lot of fun. You do things in church history and ancient scripture. It’s a thesis program. And then after that, I’ve done what we call certifications, and I’ve done that through editing and working on curriculum items. I have an English degree, and so they’ve used that to their benefit. So a lot of the research and a lot of the things that they needed to do that way, I just helped edit and do papers and projects along those lines.
Damia: Do you know of any differences between becoming a seminary and institute teacher in like Utah and Arizona versus other states? Are there any differences?
Brother Bennett: Becoming one is kind of similar, but the jobs are very different. So if you were like, let’s say you were at Weber State University, right? And you were the institute teacher there. You would have classes all day long and a few night classes too. And you wouldn’t worry about seminary programs because they have a release time program there where they have full-time individuals that that’s all they do.
And you’ll have some that that’s what they do is they teach at a seminary that’s located near a high school and we call those release time seminaries. And students come as part of their school day and take classes there. And that’s a full-time job. You’ll teach eight to, or six to eight classes a day depending on where you’re at.
So yeah, they look different, but the process to become or to get into seminaries and institutes is the same, but the jobs can look quite different.
Damia: Okay, that’s great to know. Thank you so much. Is there anything that you would have done differently getting to where you are now looking back?
Brother Bennett: Yeah, good question. No, I think the Lord was in it. And I think that it was just a good experience for me.
I think one thing to consider, I guess, if you’re going to go into it, is you really have to like teaching. You really have to like being with youth and young adults. Some people really love the gospel. And they may even really love teaching, but if they don’t really love being with youth and young adults, well, that might not actually fit the career. Does that make sense? And so you kind of have to have all three of those things, a love for the gospel, a love for teaching, and then like being around youth and young adults and spending time with them. And those three things are necessary.
Damia: Is there any other advice that you have for teens who are looking into religious education for a career?
Brother Bennett: They have changed a lot of the religious education path since I came in. And I think it’s a great thing. Recently some of the changes that they’ve made is there’s a lot more part-time availabilities now. Which is awesome, because it’s made it so that we have a lot more sisters that have come into our workforce. And they were needed. We didn’t have as many beforehand, but now that they can come in and say, “I’m gonna be a mom” or “I’m going to do the other things that I have interest in and then part-time, I can teach three to four classes of seminary or I can be an institute teacher or director.”
That has opened it up for a lot of sisters, as well as brethren, that want to do it on the side. But the part that I’ve been most excited about with that is that there’s just a lot more sisters that have come into our ranks. And man, we needed them. So it’s been awesome. I don’t know if that answered the question really well, but that’s a part I’m excited.
Damia: That’s okay. Just any advice that you had and anything else that you wanted to share is totally fine.
Brother Bennett: Yeah. I would say if you want to look more into the career, they actually have a pretty good website. The site gives a good description of what’s required and the different opportunities that are available now. And they’re worldwide, no matter where you’re at in the world, wherever the church is, seminary and institutes is. And so there’s a good chance that you’ll be needed and there’s job opportunities for you.
Damia: Again, thank you so much for joining me on my podcast.