Institutional teaching of Translation Studies has evolved in the past decades. The author believes this growth is in part due to the connection between theory and teaching practice. The present article focuses on how seven proponents of various translation theories teach in classrooms, on why theory is important for the teaching of the profession, and on the nature of theory. This discussion leads to a fundamental concern for training future translators for professional work. It is argued that translation trainees should be exposed to a variety of approaches to translation which are inspired by and relate to different theoretical schools so that students are in this way taught to be flexible in their approach to texts and also learn theory in practical application.