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The educational agency of the Executive Council has had a variety of titles and roles within the organizational structure of the Church over the years. From 1947 to 1968, it was known as the Department of Christian Education. In 1968, major elements of Council’s educational program were combined with divisions of the Home Department and other bodies as the “Services to Dioceses section” of Council; in subsequent years it seems to have been renamed the “Program Group on Education,” until about 1975, when it became the Office of Religious Education.

An Education Officer, David Perry, was appointed in 1973. Other aspects of the Church’s educational program were handled by ad hoc committees during this period, such as the Program Advisory Committee on Higher Education. Another major restructuring in 1976 eliminated ad hoc committees in favor of a system of standing committees and subcommittees. In 1979, a further wave of consolidation brought the staff and work together under the cluster title of Education for Mission and Ministry.

The Education for Mission and Ministry Unit was listed in The Church Annual up until 1991, with David Perry as its Executive Director. In 1992,the name was changed to Education, Evangelism, and Ministry Development, with David Perry still listed as Executive Director. It is unclear how and why the named changed and if the program functions also changed.

In response to urging by the Joint Commission on Ecumenical Relations, which identified the need for a single person to coordinate ecumenical efforts at the national level, the position of Ecumenical Officer was created in 1963. The first person to hold the position, Mr. Peter Day, was appointed in 1964. While initially under the Offices of the Presiding Bishop and President (1964-1971), over the decades the Ecumenical Officer shifted from one department to another: Jurisdictional Relations (1972-1974), Mission (1975-1977), National and World Mission (1978-1979), World Mission in Church and Society (1980-1990), World Mission (1991), Partnerships (1992-1994), Ecumenical and Interfaith Relations (1999-2003), Office of the Presiding Bishop (2004-2007, 2017), the Ecumenical and Interfaith division under the Partnership Center (2008-2009), the Global Partnership Team in the Mission Department (2010-2016), and Ministries Beyond the Episcopal Church (2019-current). In whichever department the office has been assigned, the Ecumenical Officer serves as the focal point for The Episcopal Church's involvement with and relationship to other churches and ecumenical organizations, both domestic and international, on common liturgical and social matters.

Following the Joint Commission on Rural Work report to the 1940 General Convention calling for more rural Church workers, a new staff officer position for “town and country” work in the Division of Domestic Mission was created. In 1949, this position expanded to a stand-alone department under the Home Department as the Division of Town and Country Work. Two years later, the Division appointed a National Advisory Committee for Town and Country Work to perform studies and make recommendations.

The Division of Town and Country Work had a particularly close relationship with the Roanridge Training Center in Missouri. The programs at Roanridge, including the Summer Parish Training Program, were administered by the National Town and Country Institute.

Emphasis on the rural mission waned in the 1960s as the national Church became more focused on urban mission. A 1961 reorganization of the Home Department saw the elimination of the Division of Town and Country, with its responsibilities being returned to the Division of Domestic Mission. The National Advisory Committee for Town and Country Work survived the reorganization and eventually dissolved in 1967.

In 1910, General Convention established the General Board of Religious Education in response to the changing landscape of higher education in the early decades of the twentieth century. In 1913, the Department of Collegiate Education was created under the Board. In 1919, with the establishment of the National Council, the Board of Religious Education became the Department of Religious Education. In 1929, the department created thirteen separate commissions for its work, one of which was a Commission on College Work. The Secretary and Commission continued to operate under these titles through 1938, when the Religious Education Department was renamed the Department of Christian Education.

In 1940, the Division of College Work was created, and in 1942 it was placed on equal footing with the Department of Christian Education, under the newly formed Home Department. As the number of college and university students grew over the decades, the scope of the division’s work grew as well. By the 1950s, the division was involved in establishing college chaplaincies, supporting local parish work, and creating missions to young women and minorities. The division also ministered to university faculty, graduate students, and foreign students. The Division of College Work was renamed the College and University Division in 1963.

The restructuring of the Church in 1967 brought about the closure of the Home Department and, with it, the College and University Division. Higher education ministries for some time thereafter were carried on in a reduced capacity and on a largely provincial or entirely local level, supplemented with some financial grants or block funds towards stipends provided by Executive Council.