Academic Update Southeastern Free Will Baptist College

In This Update

  • Accreditation Blessings!
  • Faculty for 2017-2018
  • Program Adjustment
  • Administrative Changes

Accreditation Blessings!

On April 25th, Southeastern was granted Candidate Status from the Transnational Association of Christian Colleges and Schools (TRACS). Candidate Status is the first major step towards accreditation and brings with it recognition by the US Department of Education and the Council for Higher Education in America. Because of this recognition we have been able to begin the process of application for Title IV which will provide the opportunity for federal aid for our students. This application process will take about one year. At that time our students will be able to apply for such aid as Pell Grants and student loans.

Unexpected Benefits

  • Immediately after obtaining Candidate Status we began hearing that some of our graduates have been admitted to graduate schools that were either resisting accepting our graduates or had blocked them altogether. This is encouraging news that we did not expect until we were accredited.
  • One graduate, who was entering the Army, was upgraded from an E1 status to E4 resulting in not only an immediate increase in rank but also an increase in pay because the Army now recognizes our degree.
  • One of our graduates had a job application accepted which required a college degree recognized by the US Department of Education.

Next Step

When we were examined last fall, the evaluation team left 33 "recommendations" that are required to be met before we can become fully accredited. We have already addressed about 1/3 of those recommendations. Many of the remaining ones will be corrected as we cycle through our newly formed assessment plan and strategic planning process. We have 5 years to apply for accreditation. However, we have plans to do so in 2-3 years.

Faculty for 2017-2018

As most of you know, Ron Davis left Southeastern last year as a full time employee. However, Brother Ron will return this year as an adjunct faculty teaching most of what he would have taught in his full time position.

We are excited to welcome Zachary Bell as our new choir and small groups director as well as serving as a music professor. Brother Zachary is a 1999 graduate of Southeastern, has earned a graduate degree in music and has served as a church music leader since graduation. Teaching other music classes will be Mrs. Ericka Pettit who did an outstanding job of teaching private piano lessons for us last year. We are blessed to have her mother, Mrs. Teresa Siebert, to return to teach Theory II and some private lessons.

Dr. Mike Paramore retired this spring having served as a full time professor at Southeastern for 30 years. Dr. Paramore will return as an adjunct professor teaching education (TE) classes. His literature class will be taught by Mr. D. J. Pendley and his Bible and math classes will be taught by Dr. Danny Baer.

We are pleased to have Missionary David Aycock to again teach a missions class this fall. This will be an online class that Brother Aycock will be able to facilitate from Brazil. We will also offer a pre-recorded missions class taught by Missionary Hemant Patel. Note: We apologize that in our Cooperating Board Meeting in April we prematurely announced that Brother Hemant would be with us on a full time basis next year. What we did not know (neither did Hemant) was that the situation with his visa would change allowing him to return to the mission field this fall. He will, however, return to the states the first week of January and his plan is to teach our missions classes on campus during the Spring 2018 semester.

The remainder of our classes will be taught by our usual slate of Southeastern faculty and adjuncts. The only major difference, other than those listed above, is that we will be using the TRACS approved resource of Zondervan Academic for our Beginning Greek course.

Program Adjustment

We are saddened to announce that we will not be able to offer the music majors of Church Music and Music Education for the time being. The reasons for this change follow:

  • Our enrollment has dropped to the point that we have very few students in these programs. It is extremely difficult to maintain a major degree for 1 or 2 students.
  • The departure of some of our music faculty makes this change easier in that we do not have to let any faculty go at this time.
  • We will continue to offer the degrees of Pastoral Theology and Music, Youth and Music, and Ministry and Music. For Christian School music teachers we will continue to offer Elementary and Secondary degrees with a Music Proficiency.

These degrees will enable us to continue to fulfill our mission of "training men and women for church related ministries" as most of the music leaders in our churches and music teachers in our schools need skills beyond music.

Administrative Changes

There have been some needed rearrangement of the duties and responsibilities across the campus. Dr. Danny Baer will not only continue as the Academic Dean but will also supervise the Dean of Students, Mr. Tim Gaynor, who will take on the oversight of the areas of Christian Service and student organizations. Mr. Gaynor, as Dean of Students, will continue to supervise both the Dean of Men, Cam Spain and the new Dean of Women, Sarah Marcum. Brother Steve Berry will continue to serve as Director of Development but will also supervise Brother Cam Spain who will be responsible for both the areas of maintenance and student activities including societies.

We are excited about the upcoming school year and we are looking forward to see how God will continue to work through the lives of our faculty, staff and students.

Thank you for your continued prayer and support!

Created July 5, 2017

Southeastern Free Will Baptist College - 919.365-7711 - www.sfwbc.edu

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