Plan for the Work of ATS
2008–2014

The mission of The Association of Theological Schools in the United States and Canada is to promote
the improvement and enhancement of theological schools to the benefit of communities of faith
and the broader public.

The Association seeks to implement this mission with attention to four key values:

Diversity—ATS values the different expressions of faith that are represented by member schools and seeks to respect the varying understandings of theology, polity, religious leadership, and social commitments.

Quality and Improvement—ATS schools value quality in the practice of ministry and in educational practices. Quality is always linked to improvement; even schools that have achieved a high degree of quality can improve. The Association encourages schools to advance in quality.

Collegiality—ATS values the contributions that schools make to one another. Regardless of differences in theological perspective, organizational complexity, or institutional size, ATS schools, as peer institutions, can learn from one another, cooperate on common tasks that benefit the broader community of theological schools, and hold themselves accountable to common practices and quality.

Leadership—ATS values leadership and considers it essential for schools to attain their missions. ATS is committed to developing the skills and capacities of administrators, faculties, and boards of member schools.

In addition to these core values, the Association values formal education for ministerial leadership and advocates on behalf of its benefits for religious leaders, religious institutions, and the work of religion in broader publics; values justice in society and institutions and seeks to embody justice in its organizational life; values accountability for student learning; and both values and advocates for quality in the practice of ministry.

In support of this mission and these values, the Association has three core functions that it performs on behalf of graduate, professional theological education in the United States and Canada: leadership education, issues and initiatives, and communications and data. The Association maintains a plan that identifies strategies and relates those strategies to the core functions of the Association. The plan of work extends for six years and is revised biennially; the current plan is based on, and updates, the 2006 version of the plan of work.

Core Functions

Leadership Education. ATS provides a venue for the education of senior administrative officers through conferences and seminars and the development of faculty through regranting programs and workshops related to skills, perceptions, and knowledge crucial to their work as theological educators.

Issues and Initiatives. The Association conducts applied research and convenes conversations about critical issues in theological education that need to be addressed in order to enhance understanding of theological education or to enable the schools to develop new skills or perspectives necessary for their development and improvement.

Communications and Data. The Association publishes the Bulletin as the formal record of its work; a journal, Theological Education; the Fact Book on Theological Education; and a variety of publications in support of various programs and emphases. The Association and the Commission on Accrediting maintain databases on student attitudes and perceptions and a comprehensive database on the member institutions. These data provide resources that serve the member schools, the media, and the scholarly study of theological education and the theological disciplines.

Strategies Related to the Core Functions of the Association 2008–2014

In the context of the core functions of the Association, the following strategies are being or will be implemented. The strategies listed below do not describe every aspect of the Association’s work; rather, they are strategies that require multiple-year effort. As the Association implements its work during this six-year planning cycle, it will give attention to the use of technology and continue to lift up the value of diversity in theological education. These strategies seek both to contribute to stability of schools at a time of considerable change and to lead the schools toward the innovations that the future will require. To the extent possible, the Association seeks to address new topics of interest within ongoing programs. Because much of the work of the Association is funded by foundation grants, the work plan identifies the funding resource for each agenda item. In many cases, the current grant supporting an area of work will expire during this six-year time frame, and continuation funding will need to be sought. If no funding has been identified, it is noted with the agenda item. ATS may also undertake other work of shorter duration during this time frame. While work may rightly be classified into more than one ATS function and, at times, may best be understood in terms of its importance for more than one function, this plan identifies strategies within the function of the Association with which they are most closely related in terms of the kind of work the strategy primarily entails.

1.         Leadership Education

ATS will maintain and enhance its system and curriculum for the ongoing education of administrative leaders and the development of faculty, addressing the interconnection of accreditation issues and leadership education events, as well as those pragmatic concerns specific to each group. It will continue to administer grants programs in support of faculty development and the advancement of scholarship in the theological disciplines. While these programs will benefit individual administrators and faculty, they will be conducted with the goal of enhancing and improving theological schools.

1.1       Education for Administrative Leaders

1.1.1    Presidents. ATS will continue to conduct the annual New Presidents Seminar, the week-long Presidential Leadership Intensive, and the University Deans Meeting and will develop an event for those presidents, deans, or principals whose schools are nested within other educational entities. In addition, support will continue for educational events in particular settings, such as the yearly gathering of African American Presidents. (Funding provided by Participant Fees and ATS Leadership Education for Theological Educators grant.)

1.1.2    Professional Development Organizations for Administrative Officers. ATS has fostered the formation of three organizations for specific leadership groups: the Chief Academic Officers Society (CAOS), the Student Personnel Administrators Network (SPAN), and the Chief Financial Officers Society (CFOS), in addition to the long-standing work of the Development and Institutional Advancement Program (DIAP). During this time period, ATS will complete the Handbook for Academic Deans (a project of CAOS), provide expanded support for financial aid officers as a part of SPAN programming, and experiment with focusing on some common program themes across the different leadership education organizations. ATS will also provide ongoing support for the steering committees of each of these programmatic organizations in planning, implementing, and evaluating educational events. The Leadership Education Council will coordinate work across programmatic organizations. (Funding provided by Participant Fees and ATS Leadership Education for Theological Educators grant.)

1.2       Education for Women and Racial/Ethnic Faculty and Administrators

1.2.1    Women in Leadership. ATS will continue its programmatic support for women in leadership in theological education, including both faculty and administrators. ATS conducts a fall conference for women faculty and administrators and a spring retreat for senior women administrators. In addition, the program will examine the implications of recent research on women in theological education to explore future directions for this work. In addition to support for women faculty and administrators, ATS will implement programming during this time period toward enhancing the capacity of schools to provide hospitable environments for the leadership of women as they contribute to the common work of theological education. (Funding provided by the ATS Leadership Education for Theological Educators grant and the Carpenter Foundation grant for the research component.)

 

1.2.2    Racial/Ethnic Leadership. While ATS will continue sponsoring educational programming in support of racial/ethnic administrative leaders and faculty in theological schools, work during this planning period will increasingly involve undertaking events that focus on building the capacity of ATS schools to function more effectively as racially inclusive environments and as educators of both white and racial/ethnic students for ministry in racial/ethnic and multicultural contexts. (Funding provided by ATS Leadership Education for Theological Educators grant.)

1.3       Faculty Development

1.3.1    Newly Appointed Faculty. ATS will continue the annual New Faculty Seminar for recently appointed faculty who are new to theological education. The seminar is structured to explore the collective vocation of faculty as a corporate entity and individual vocational issues necessarily raised by employment in these institutions. (Funding provided by Participant Fees and ATS Leadership Education for Theological Educators grant.)

1.3.2    The Henry Luce III Fellows in Theology Program. ATS will continue to administer this premier program in theological research, in consultation with the Henry Luce Foundation. The program provides salary and benefit replacement funds, when matched by the fellow’s institution, for a full year of research leave. ATS will also engage the participation of Luce fellowship recipients in other ATS conferences and workshops to cultivate their leadership, as scholars, in the broader work of the Association. (Funding provided by the Henry Luce III Fellows in Theology grant.)

1.3.3    The Lilly Theological Research Grants Program. This program makes three kinds of grants to faculty in ATS member schools that have candidate or accredited status with the ATS Commission on Accrediting: grants to faculty who have an approved research leave, grants to faculty as research stipends in lieu of some teaching responsibilities in the academic year or summer, and grants for expenses related to research, such as travel. Proposals related to the scholarly understanding of theological education will be considered, as well as proposals for research that advance theological disciplines. The project sponsors workshops for faculty that focus on proposal development, finding resources for faculty research, and writing for different audiences. (Funding provided by Lilly Theological Research Grants Program grant.)

 

1.4       Institutional Development

ATS will conduct conferences that focus on issues crucial to the improvement and enhancement of theological schools. Different conferences will involve different constituencies in ATS member schools.

1.4.1    Governance. In cooperation with In Trust, ATS will extend a series of conferences that began in 2006 on governance in theological schools. Effective governance is crucial to the well-being of theological schools, and problems in governance deter schools from their educational missions and deprive them of organizational health. (Funding provided by ATS Leadership Education for Theological Educators grant.)

1.4.2    Assessment. During the time period, ATS will implement an annual workshop on the assessment of theological learning. Assessment of learning continues to be a crucial institutional skill that schools need to develop, and these workshops will provide practical, skill-based resources for assessing learning. (Funding provided by participant fees after grant funding is completed in 2009.)

1.4.3    Consultations on Faculty as Theological Educators. ATS will conduct occasional conferences for faculty that focus on their identity and work as theological educators. Faculty have a central role in curriculum development, degree program evaluation, relating theological studies to current needs and issues in communities of faith, and the intellectual work that advances theological disciplines and serves the intellectual needs of communities of faith. (Funding provided by the Leadership Education for Theological Educators grant.)

2.         Issues and Initiatives in Theological Education

During the period of this plan of work, ATS will extend its work on one project with a different focus and begin or conclude two new major projects.

2.1       Theological Schools and the Church. ATS will maintain an ongoing emphasis in a variety of its activities to enhance churches’ understanding about the function of theological schools in the context of the churches’ missions, and the schools’ understanding of the function of the church in the mission of theological schools. ATS will also focus on the changing character of the religious leadership “workforce,” and the relationship of these changes to the theological schools, degree programs, and patterns of educational offerings, including a reassessment of the purposes, educational goals, curriculum, and educational practices associated with graduate professional degree programs conducted by ATS member schools. This project will contribute to the efforts of the major project of the Commission on Accrediting to review and revise the standards and procedures for accreditation between 2008 and 2012. (Funding provided by a continuation of the Theological Schools and the Church: Finding a Future Together grant.)

2.2       Institutional Viability and Financially Stressed Theological Schools. A significant number of ATS schools are experiencing substantive and enduring financial stress that threatens their ability to attain their respective missions. ATS will seek to identify underlying issues that result in chronic financial stress, patterns of institutional responses that could ameliorate the impact of this stress while schools are seeking remedy, and patterns of institutional effort that could provide for healthier financial futures for these schools. In collaboration with the Auburn Center for the Study of Theological Education and In Trust, the Association will redevelop the Strategic Information Report to strengthen its usefulness by the schools in the areas of governance, administration, and institutional planning and assessment. ATS will also develop instructional guides to enhance the usefulness of the Institutional Peer Profile Report and the Strategic Information Report. (Funding needs to be obtained.)

2.3       Christian Ministry in an Increasingly Religiously Plural Continent. Among the many changes that are occurring in North America is the growth of religious communities other than the Christian and Jewish faiths with which ATS schools have been most closely identified. The increasing number of adherents to these other faiths in North America will invariably affect the practice of Christian ministry. Ministers and priests will need to be better informed about the commitments and practices of these religious communities; they will need to expand their own theology with a theology of world religions; and they will need to be able to minister in the contexts of interreligious interaction and engagement in the settings where they will serve. Religion has been both a uniting and dividing influence, and ATS schools will need to identify those practices that the majority religion in North America should undertake to ensure religion’s positive contribution as the continent experiences the increasing presence and cultural power of other faiths. (Funding needs to be obtained.)

3.         Communications and Data

ATS has a comprehensive information technology system, institutional and student information databases, Web site, and an array of print publications that support its work. The primary work planned for 2008–2014 focuses on promoting the use of these resources among the member schools and expanding efforts to communicate electronically with key constituencies in the schools.

3.1       ATS Publications. The Association maintains an extensive publications program in both print and electronic formats. During this cycle of work, the Association will make expanded use of electronic communication with various member school constituencies to direct them routinely to new editions of publications and other pertinent resources as they appear on the Web site. (Funding from ATS operational budget.)

3.2       ATS Web site. ATS will continue to develop its Web site as a vehicle for communicating the Association’s priorities and work, providing timely information on Association programs and activities, offering publications and resources in electronic form, educating the public about theological education, and offering resources for use by media representatives and researchers in theological education. Ongoing attention to the site will improve its intuitive use by visitors to the site. ATS will develop needed interpretive resources for those using the Annual Data Tables published on the Web site. (Funding provided by ATS operational budget.)

3.3       Strategic Communications Plan. The Association will implement an ongoing strategic communications plan that addresses communications with member schools, affiliate and allied organizations, the media, the philanthropic community, the Pittsburgh area, and national audiences. (Funding provided by ATS operational budget.)

3.4       Student Information Resources. The Association will continue to educate school leaders in the use of the Profiles of Ministry instruments, Entering, Graduating, and Alumni Questionnaires, analyze the data generated by the use of these resources, and encourage a culture of ongoing analysis in member schools. Student Information Resources will also continue to work on providing resources to member schools to facilitate analysis and assessment, and to help them relate this information to the accrediting standards. During this time period, ATS will develop user guides to increase usefulness of group reports that schools receive, Web-based technological resources, and ongoing collaboration with both accreditation and leadership education via printed materials, meetings, and workshops. (Funding provided by user fees from the Student Resources instruments and questionnaires.)

3.5       Technology. ATS will assess technological advances on an ongoing basis and implement changes as appropriate to its mission and service to the member schools. During this period, the Association will implement its new institutional database, add educational modules to the Web site to assist schools in the use of Commission data in the preparation of self-studies and in institutional and educational assessment. ATS will explore the possibility of launching a peer group for educational technologists that would become self-sustaining. (Funding provided by the Institutional Database Conversion grant and ATS operational budget.)

4.         Association Support

The function of Association Support undergirds the work and mission of ATS. There are two areas of work proposed for special attention during the period of this work plan.

4.1       Program Evaluation. The Association will continue the implementation of a comprehensive process of evaluation that will enable it to assess the extent to which stated goals have been attained and the impact of ATS efforts in the improvement and enhancement of theological schools. (Funding provided by the conclusion of the Evaluation grant, evaluation lines in existing and future grants, and the ATS operational budget.)

4.2       ATS Facilities. ATS programming and staff have grown since the building was first occupied in 1991, and the building needs substantial reconfiguration in order to continue to provide adequate space for offices and for meetings. ATS will reconfigure the interior space of its office in Pittsburgh to better meet current programming and staff needs. (Funding needs to obtained.)