What is so different about a Gilead graduation? “Several things,” answers Frederick W. Franz, the school’s current president. “For one, graduates of other schools have completed courses of their own selection that have prepared them for a career in a field of their own choosing. But here at Gilead School all graduates shared in the same courses and had their missionary assignments chosen for them. The Governing Body selects the course and the territory to which each missionary will be sent.”

The goals are another reason why Gilead graduation is different. To explain this, let us go back in history to Gilead’s first graduation exercise. Note what Nathan H. Knorr, the first president of the school, said to those gathered:

“The men of this world, and their women and children, are storing up riches on this earth, trying to have a place of security insured to them. But do they really succeed? They can never be secure against the destruction unavoidably due to come upon the whole world. However, those who have entered into a covenant with God are storing up riches in heaven that will not rust or be destroyed. They have value with God, who is in heaven.

“So, then, the work that you Bible [school] graduates do in . . . proclaiming the Kingdom message . . . where witnesses have never gone before . . . is a vital work preliminary to the establishment of the [New Order] of righteousness.”

The goal of Gilead graduates is not material wealth or prestige through employment. Instead, they eagerly look forward to graduation as a means of satisfying their burning desire to preach the “good news” of God’s kingdom and to “make disciples of people of all the nations.” And their missionary assignment can reach into the new system of things where they can teach the “good news” to resurrected ones.​—Mark 13:10; Matthew 28:19; John 5:28, 29.