Ad Crucem NewsLCMS 2026

Ad Crucem NewsLCMS 2026 ConventionMethodology

How the reports rubric works.

Every workbook report is scored on six axes, each on a one-to-five scale. The total (out of 30) maps to a letter grade. The intent is to surface which reports actually tell the church what is happening, candidly, with specifics, in confessional terms, with accountability built in, with mission clarity, and with direction.

Ad Crucem NewsLCMS 2026 ConventionAxes

The six axes.

  1. 1

    Candor

    Willingness to acknowledge difficulty, decline, failure, or struggle. Honest reporting on what isn't working.

  2. 2

    Specificity

    Concrete figures, named persons and places, dates, dollar amounts, percentages, and citations.

  3. 3

    Confessional

    Explicit Lutheran confessional language: affirm, reaffirm, uphold, reject, Word and Sacrament, references to the Confessions.

  4. 4

    Accountability

    Performance reporting, audit references, financial transparency, measurable outcomes, oversight.

  5. 5

    Mission

    Gospel proclamation, evangelism, discipleship, missionary support, outreach, witness.

  6. 6

    Direction

    Forward-looking language: plans, recommendations, goals, the next triennium's aims.

Ad Crucem NewsLCMS 2026 ConventionScoring

From signals to score.

Each axis starts with a count of signals: regex patterns matched against the report’s body. Specificity counts named clergy, dollar amounts, percentages, years, and large numbers. Confessional counts explicit Lutheran terms and references to the Book of Concord. Mission counts Gospel-proclamation, evangelism, discipleship, and outreach language. And so on for the other three.

Counts are then normalized to a 1–5 score by quintile rank within the corpus of 96reports. A report with zero signals on an axis scores 1. A report in the top quintile of nonzero signals scores 5. The middle quintiles fill 2–4 evenly.

The total of the six axis scores (max 30) maps to a letter grade:

  • A27–30— consistently strong across axes.
  • B23–26— solid with one or two soft axes.
  • C18–22— mixed; plays some axes well, others not.
  • D13–17— most axes weak, may be narrowly scoped.
  • F< 13— minimal substance the rubric can detect.

Ad Crucem NewsLCMS 2026 ConventionHonest framing

Algorithmic and provisional.

These scores are provisional. An algorithm cannot read for tone, for what is left unsaid, or for whether a report’s confessional language is genuinely confessional or boilerplate. The pattern counts are a baseline visible to readers. Anyone reading a report can see the same evidence the algorithm saw, and can disagree with the score.

Editorial overrides take precedence. When Ad Crucem News has read a report closely and assigns a different score on any axis, that score replaces the algorithmic one and the report displays as an editorial assessment with notes describing the reasoning. Otherwise the score is labeled algorithmic so readers know what they are looking at.

Reports whose body could not be reliably extracted from the workbook PDF (the long-form CTCR theological documents in particular) are marked unscored — body unavailable and are not included in the leaderboard.

Ad Crucem NewsLCMS 2026 ConventionTop of the rubric (algorithmic)

  1. 1R13.5 · POLICY REQUIREMENTS FOR THE SPECIFIC MINISTRY PASTOR PROGRAM:A29/30
  2. 2R13.6 · Report R13.6A28/30
  3. 3R1 · PresidentA27/30
  4. 4R1.2.1 · Office of National MissionA27/30
  5. 5R13.3 · Report R13.3A27/30
  6. 6R61 · Opinions of the Commission on Constitutional MattersB26/30
  7. 7R1.1 · Church RelationsB25/30
  8. 8R2.1 · Colloquy Committee for Pastoral MinistryB24/30
  9. 9R14 · Concordia University SystemB24/30
  10. 10R14.5 · Concordia University Wisconsin and Ann ArborB24/30