ACTS Seminaries Update 2024
Started in 1989, ACTS Seminaries has been a collaborative educational society with member schools and affiliates working together to provide specific graduate degree programs. MB Seminary has been one of the members since 1999, and its membership within ACTS has been measurably valuable (click here for a history of MB Seminary).
As you can imagine, an academic consortium like this is complex to manage and lead. As independent institutions, MB Seminary and other members have grown and expanded beyond the original intent and design of ACTS, and it has been difficult at times for the members to maintain effective ways to achieve our common goals. There have been many conversations during the last few years about discerning the best path ahead.
This letter from the ACTS Board summarizes the key outcomes of the most recent Board meeting. The ACTS Board intends to transition the core elements of ACTS graduate programs to Trinity Western University, which will create its own School of Theology to provide continuity for current ACTS graduate students. The members of ACTS (e.g., MB Seminary) will explore what new academic relationships with TWU could look like in the future.
MB Seminary will continue as a national graduate theological school with its provincially granted degree-granting charter.
In terms of process, this proposed change of governance must be approved by the Association of Theological Schools (a credentialing body), and the members of ACTS must approve the transition plan, which is under development. If everything goes according to the expected timeline, this transition will occur in May 2026.
Only the jointly managed graduate programs of ACTS will be affected by this transition.
Everything else that MB Seminary does (Teaching Churches, MB Seminary Online, Navigate webinars, devotionals, etc.) will continue. MB Seminary’s graduate courses and degrees offered through Teaching Churches across Canada continue to grow, with a new partnership launching in Ontario this fall. We are in active conversation with other possible Teaching Churches as well.
As the landscape of Christian higher education continues to evolve, MB Seminary’s distributed model of ministry training and education positions us well to serve our Canadian and international constituencies. Even in the middle of change, these are exciting days.
MB Seminary is blessed to have a strong board, faculty, and staff team, and we have anticipated many of these changes. Please pray for wisdom, vision, energy, creativity, favour, and resources so that MB Seminary can increase its ministry impact during the next 5, 10, 20, and even 50 years!
If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me.
MARK WESSNER
President, MB Seminary