Pathways for Tomorrow

Overview of the Initiative
In January 2021, Lilly Endowment Inc. launched its three-phase Pathways for Tomorrow Initiative designed to "help theological schools strengthen and sustain their capacities to prepare and support pastoral leaders for Christian churches." Phase One consisted of nine-month planning grants of up to $50,000 to 234 ATS member schools to help them explore challenges and opportunities they wished to pursue.

Phase Two of the Pathways Initiative was launched in January 2022, consisting of five-year grants of up to $1 million awarded to 84 ATS member schools to help them prioritize and respond to their most pressing challenges as they work to prepare pastoral leaders for Christian congregations both now and into the future. In June 2022, the Endowment approved grants to 21 additional ATS schools for Phase Two.

In the competitive, final phase of the Pathways Initiative, the Endowment approved five-year, multimillion-dollar grants to 16 ATS member schools in June 2022 and in September 2022. These grants are to fund large-scale, collaborative projects among Phase Three schools, along with their partners, to strengthen their capacities to prepare and support pastors and lay ministers as well as to work toward offering sustainable models or strategies that—if effective—could be adopted by other schools. 

Read more about the Endowment's Pathways for Tomorrow Initiative.

The ATS Coordination Program
In December 2021, ATS received a five-year grant from the Endowment to oversee the coordination program for Phase Two of the Endowment's Pathways for Tomorrow Initiative. In September 2022, the Endowment awarded ATS a five-year supplemental grant to further assist the Phase Two expansion to 105 schools, to support the Phase Three partnerships, to extend resource programming for Phase Two and Phase Three schools, and to increase funding to make learnings from Pathways grantees available to the wider ATS membership. The coordination program will provide resources, research, support, and a learning community for the grantees focused on innovation, collaboration, and adaptive learning. Activities will include:
    • webinars and team gatherings aimed at strengthening grantees’ projects,
    • peer learning communities centered on various challenges and opportunities being
      addressed by the grantees,
    • annual research projects to support the work of the grantees,
    • mentors and coaches for cohorts of senior leaders as they lead their organizations through
      adaptive change,
    • support for project leaders—including the onboarding of new personnel,
    • an advisory committee to aid in the design of peer groups and research projects, and
    • a virtual resource center to make learning and research available among ATS, its member
      schools, collaborating organizations, and theological education researchers.

ATS will be collaborating with the In Trust Center for Theological Schools, which also received a grant to support the coordination work. 

• Pathways for Tomorrow Advisory Committee
• Learn more about the schools, partners, and projects comprising Phase 3