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The Complete Guide to Becoming A Director, Religious Activity and Education
The real job, the real pay, the real path — everything you need to decide if leading faith-based education and programming is your next move.
by Alumigogo Books
Chapter 1: What Does a Director, Religious Activity and Education Actually Do?
What a Director of Religious Activity and Education Actually Does
Let's strip away the title and the stained-glass imagery. A Director of Religious Activity and Education — often called a DRE, a Director of Faith Formation, or a Religious Education Coordinator — is the person who makes the congregation's learning happen. Think of them as the head of a small school that never closes. They are not the senior pastor, who preaches and provides overarching spiritual leadership. The DRE is the one who wakes up at 6 AM to ensure there are enough crayons for the third-grade class, the one who emails 14 volunteers about the upcoming youth retreat, and the one who knows every child's name in the Sunday school program.
The core of the job is building and running educational programming. This means designing the curriculum for Sunday school, organizing confirmation or bar/bat mitzvah preparation, leading youth group gatherings, and setting up adult Bible study or scripture discussion groups. On any given week, a DRE will spend hours researching a new curriculum package, adapting it to fit the congregation's specific theological tradition, or writing their own lessons from scratch. A curriculum package is simply a pre-made set of lesson plans, activities, and worksheets published by a denomination or a religious education company. Many DREs use them as a starting point, but almost every one modifies them heavily to match their community's needs, like adjusting a script