Spring Updates from Your Alumni Office

Asbury Theological Seminary’s more than 11,000 alumni in 77 countries, in all 50 US states, and in 149 unique denominations worldwide work together to make a Kingdom impact across the globe. We are proud to serve our alumni who work in diverse capacities spreading the gospel of Christ around the world. Check out some of these incredible updates!

Alumni Council Meetings 2021

Next year’s Alumni Council Meetings are scheduled to take place 23 August 2021 – 27 August 2021 in Washington, DC.

Alumni Giving Initiative for the 2020-2021 Academic Year: A Look at the Global Legacy of Asbury Theological Seminary’s Faithful Alumni

The 2020-2021 alumni fundraising initiative will be a project to renovate the bottom floor hallway of Crary-McPheeters, the building which houses the Office of Alumni and Church Relations as well as Advancement and the majority of high-level administrative offices. Included in the renovation are plans to transform Royal Auditorium into a high-tech meeting center for Alumni and Board of Trustee needs.

The work on the hallway has begun with ceiling painting, electrical work, preliminary art designs, and a fresh coat of paint on the walls. There are pictures at the end of this report that show some of the work that will be done.

Shepherds Fund

 Since summer 2018, the Alumni Office has been working hand-in-hand with the SOMA foundation to develop a program called The Shepherds Fund. SOMA wanted to provide funds to retired Asbury Seminary alumni who have medical needs but limited income. The largest payout is up to 10k a year and this can be renewed yearly. The needs could include prohibitive pharmaceutical costs, housing maintenance, surgery expenses, costly therapy, etc. There is both a paper form and an electronic form option for applying to the program, and there is a vetting process to determine those who are eligible. Those who are eligible include retired alumni, their spouses or widow/ers, their minor children, or their disabled adult children who are under their care.

To date, we are pleased to announce that we have approved 166 applications for alumni in need, and the foundation has approved a total of $1,382,378.61 to be paid out on behalf of our alumni! Glory to God for this precious gift!

Unveiling a New Resource for Placement: The Ministry and Vocation Connections System

A little over a year ago, Dr. Tennent asked the Alumni Office to begin overseeing the Official Visitors program, which served all the denominational and church/ministry representatives who wished to visit our campus for the purpose of recruiting our students for future employment and ministry opportunities. For the past year, we have been listening to those who are looking for work and those who are seeking to hire our students and alumni, and we have heard and observed the things which have made the networking and recruiting process so difficult. 

With in-person interviewing visits to our physical campuses, there have historically been several barriers to cross when connecting those who wish to hire ATS students and alumni with the whole of our global community:

• Traveling to each campus site can be expensive, time consuming, and wildly inefficient.
• It is impossible to reach the whole of our global community by visiting our physical campuses only. ExL students and alumni are unable to be reached in this manner. Even students who are on campus often do not respond well to this method.
• It is difficult to arrange travel and in-person meetings during a time that is convenient both for the Connection and the student/alumnus.
• Notifying students of every individual in-person interview opportunity is not effective when there are numerous similar announcements. They tend to become static and get ignored.

With all of the adjustments we have needed to make to our programming due to coronavirus, we found it necessary to provide a digital means for this networking to continue to occur unhindered and at low risk to our community. We have devised a system to help our community network more efficiently between those who are looking for positions and those who are searching for quality candidates to fill them, and we anticipate this system will solve many of the problems inherent in the old Official Visits system! With our NEW Ministry and Vocation Connection system, ministry and vocation connections can engage the whole of our global community—both students and alumni—without the need to bombard everyone with undue announcements.

If an alumnus or student is looking for work and would like to see our list of registered Connections and request an interview: Anyone who is a part of our ATS community can view one page to receive information regarding Connections (that’s people who want to hire our people) who are offering interviews. They  may view and send emails to registered Connections via our Ministry and Vocation Connection Page on Asbury Connect. There will no longer be any need to rely on email announcements when individuals are on campus and want to interview.

If anyone would like to become a Connection to provide job and ministry opportunities within our system: All individuals and organizations who would like to hire or develop a ministry or vocational relationship with Asbury Theological Seminary’s students or alumni have one page and one short form to register and begin networking within our system. They simply leave their information with us via our Ministry and Vocation Connection Registration Portal, and we will contact them personally to set up their account details. We strongly encourage alumni—not just outside reps—to register as Connections if they have hiring needs or would like to mentor potential ministry candidates through seminary!

ThriveU

We have been very excited to see the strong response we are getting from our alumni regarding our offerings on ThriveU! We have had an explosion of growth as more and more alumni are signing up for this resource. At the time of our last board report, we had a whopping 1,119 users (up from 854 the previous year). Now, we are pleased to announce that we have grown to 1,284 users! The current course offerings are as follows:

• Revelation 666 – Dr. Robert Mulholland
• Mark Preaching Series – Dr. Timothy Tennent
• Healing Prayer – Dr. Stephen Seamands
• The Mind of the Spirit – Dr. Craig Keener
• Spiritual Formation – Dr. Robert Mulholland
• Worship Leadership in the Church – Dr. Bob Stamps
• Worship Team Development – Ranjo Clements
• Spiritual Warfare – Dr. Stephen Seamands
• The Spirit Filled Life Preaching Series – Dr. Timothy Tennent
• Doctrine of the Holy Spirit – Dr. Stephen Seamands
• Church Management and Administration – Dr. Tom Tumblin
• Care of Persons- Dr. Tony Headley
• Leading Change – Dr. Bryan Sims
• Social and Congregational Change – Dr. Stephen Offutt
• Faith, Reason, and Christian Belief – Dr. Kevin Kinghorn
• Church History I – Dr. J. Steven O’Malley
• Christian Ethics – Dr. James R. Thobaben
• Means of Grace Sermon Series – Dr. Timothy Tennent
• Science and Christian Faith – Dr. Michael Peterson
• C.S. Lewis and the Christian Faith – Dr. Michael Peterson
• Gospel Catechesis – Dr. Ellen Marmon

Graduation

After courageously adjusting many times, the Provost’s Office has arranged for a digital commencement for the 326 graduates who comprise our class of 2020 to be honored. Our office prepared and shipped a gift package with personalized note to each graduate, as we are deeply saddened whenever we are unable to give them their alumni Bibles in person. Included in each package are other small gifts as well as a full description of their alumni benefits and our contact information. The Office of Alumni will be mailing packages to all May 2021 graduates as well.

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