European Methodists establish Methodist E-Academy

By Sergei Nikolaev and David Field*

Members of the United Methodist Theological Schools in Europe meet in Moscow, where church leaders announced the launch of the Methodist E-Academy. A UMNS photo courtesy of the United Methodist Board of Higher Education and Ministry.

MOSCOW, Russia (UMNS)--A new institution that aims to provide theological education via the Internet was named the Methodist E-Academy during a meeting of the United Methodist Theological Schools in Europe.

An ongoing project since 2006, the academy's development has been shepherded by an advisory board chaired by Bishop Patrick Streiff of Central and Southern Europe. Instructors who will conduct the online courses were trained at a gathering just prior to the Feb. 8-9 meeting of the European school leaders.

The courses will address the growing need to provide theological education for prospective pastors for United Methodist churches, especially in Eastern Europe. The United Methodist Church is growing in Eastern Europe, but its numbers are not yet large enough to warrant establishing and supporting new local United Methodist seminaries.

Founded in 1999, UMTSE was created to better coordinate United Methodist training in Europe.
The E-Academy was conceived during the association's meeting in February 2006, when the group proposed that prospective elders should receive their theological education at non-United Methodist institutions in their own countries, supplemented by online courses in United Methodist studies. The United Methodist Board of Higher Education and Ministry provided $60,000 to pay the salary and travel costs for an instructional technologist, computer software and technical support, and to hire tutors who will train faculty on e-learning and course design.

"The new distance learning program is a cooperative effort between the theological education programs and seminaries in Europe," said the Rev. Mary Ann Moman, associate chief executive of the Division of Ordained Ministry of the United Methodist Board of Higher Education and Ministry.

"Technical assistance has come from theological educators in the United States and Great Britain. The Methodist E-Academy will make theological education available for persons in Europe unable to access education in more traditional ways."

Although this plan started with United Methodist churches in Europe, it now works in cooperation with the British United Methodist Church and the autonomous Methodist churches in Portugal and Italy.

The Methodist E-Academy will offer its first courses in United Methodist studies this fall, with plans to expand the offerings to include courses for the training of local pastors and lay preachers. Faculty members have been drawn from the existing church-related seminaries in Europe and retired professors, as well as from British Methodist institutions.

In other action:
.Seminary reports were received from the United Methodist seminaries and training programs in Warsaw, Poland; Tallinn, Estonia; Gothenburg, Sweden; Graz, Austria; Oslo, Norway; Reutlingen, Germany; Banska Bystritsa, Slovakia; Madrid, Spain; and Moscow and from the French Study Program.
.Holger Eschmann, a professor at Reutlingen Seminary in Germany, together with Lewis Parks, director of the doctor of ministry program at Wesley Seminary in Washington D.C., will coordinate the 2009 class for the doctor of ministry program "Leadership for a Global Church in the Wesleyan Spirit."
.The European Historical Society will hold "The Last Phase of Twentieth-Century European Methodism" conference in Budapest, Hungary, in August of 2010 under the leadership of Ulrike Schuler, professor of church history at the United Methodist Seminary in Reutlingen.
.Joerg Barthel, director of Reutlingen Seminary, was elected president of UMTSE, and Sergei Nikolaev, president of the Russia United Methodist Seminary in Moscow, was elected secretary through 2012.
.Moman updated participants on developments with the Division of Ordained Ministry and the Board of Higher Education and informed participants about upcoming issues to come before the 2008 United Methodist General Conference this spring.
.Maxine Beach, vice president and dean of the Theological School at Drew University in Madison, N.J., reported on trends in some U.S. United Methodist seminaries.

The next meeting of UMTSE deans is scheduled for February 2010 in Oslo.

*Nikolaev is the president of the Russia United Methodist Seminary in Moscow, and Field is the coordinator of the European E-Learning Program. This article was provided by the United Methodist Board of Higher Education and Ministry.