Worldwide contacts help Samford students

After 160 years of education, Samford University continues to fulfill its mission to prepare students for lives of service through connections to other Baptist bodies worldwide.
   
In a report to Alabama Baptist State Convention messengers, the university thanked the state convention for its continued support of missions and education with a personal presentation by Lillian Lim, dean of the Baptist Theological Seminary in Singapore.
   
“I am a product of your longstanding commitment to theological education,” said Lim, a representative of the Asia Baptist Federation and numerous other Baptist organizations. “It made it possible for me to be trained and equipped and now to serve actively in different capacities all over Asia.”
   
University President Thomas Corts also expressed his gratitude for the $2 million grant recently received from the Lilly Endowment to establish a resource center for pastoral excellence that will encourage spiritual, physical, social and intellectual renewal of ministers.
   
“We understand that the ministry is an extremely demanding profession,” Corts said. “It doesn’t offer many of the perquisites that are offered in other lines of work. The renewal process among church leaders is extremely important and we’ve tried to design a program that has something for everyone.”
   
Corts described its six basic components:
   
–Sabbath leave program that will provide stipends for brief leaves on Samford’s campus;
   
–Pastoral Partnerships for Excellence program for successful midcareer pastors with differing educational and racial backgrounds;
   
–Ongoing peer support program for pastors in the Birmingham area;
   
–Pastoral sustenance network systems, which will provide assistance for pastors in rural areas in Southern Baptist associations;
   
–Apprenticeship programs between college-aged, licensed ministers and youth pastors;
   
–National conferences that will be held to bring center participants together to compare ideas.
   
Other recent university awards and accomplishments listed in the 2002 Book of Reports include the following:
   
–U.S. News & World Report named Samford the fifth best university in the South in their “America’s Best Colleges for 2002–2003.”
   
–The U.S. Department of Education presented its first national award for effective teacher preparation to Samford’s Orlean Bullard Beeson School of Education and Professional Studies.
   
–Samford’s Cumberland School of Law ranked fifth in the trial advocacy specialty in U.S. News & World Report.
   
–Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching selected a Samford professor to receive the Teacher of the Year award.
   
Many friends and graduates of Samford University also gathered Nov. 19 for the annual Samford breakfast, a traditional part of Alabama Baptist Convention activity.
   
A highlight of the event, held in the Shades Mountain Baptist Church fellowship hall, was the presentation of Minister of the Year awards. Charles T. Carter, James H. Chapman Fellow of Pastoral Ministry at Samford’s Beeson Divinity School, presided.
   
Friends of the honorees traveled from across the state to attend the breakfast.