The World Ministries program at SAGU has been revised to now include an innovative feature of experiential learning.  World Ministries students will now spend a semester of their junior year in a cross-cultural setting while taking classes through SAGU’s School of Distance Education.  Implementation of the new program will be in the fall of 2008 and excitement is already growing among students who plan to take advantage of the opportunity. 

According to World Ministries Director and Missions Department Chair Joel Watson, “There are plenty of programs that teach you and then send you out to see ‘real life.’  That is effective for some purposes.  This program, however, requires students to live for a semester in a cross-cultural location and continue their studies, tying their academic pursuits to the population group in which they are living, teaching the future field practitioner to implement what they are learning.  In addition, while overseas, they will have assignments that take them to online discussions with their colleagues studying the same courses but on different continents and among completely different people and religious groups.  Issues of evangelism and discipleship, leadership training among Muslims, animists, nominal Christians (and a number of other possibilities) will be compared and contrasted in real time in a world laboratory, resulting in contextual understanding impossible to achieve in a classroom.”

The degree is a 126 hour program designed to prepare the graduate to successfully communicate the Gospel and minister in cross-cultural environments internationally.  Within the program are several courses that intentionally address the area of cross-cultural needs.  As part of the revisions, three new courses - Opportunities in US, World Ministries, and a course on Relief and Development – will be launched in 2008 as precursors to other additions the following year.  The 12-hour internship block includes the courses Cross-Cultural Ministries Principles and Practices, Strategies of Multiethnic Ministry, Evangelism and Discipleship, and Mentoring and Mobilizing Ministry Leaders.  Possibilities for internship locations include Mexico, Thailand, South Africa, France, Mexico and within the United States.

Believing that students must have models of successful ministry, the SAGU Missions Department exposes students to effective practitioners whose commitment is evident through fruitful ministry.  This exposure comes through guest classroom lecturers, seminar presenters and cross-cultural ministers in residence as well as faculty members who regularly minister in cross-cultural contexts.  In addition, with recent innovations to the program, the internship will place a student in direct contact with an individual known for effectiveness in his or her field who will be able to mentor and invest in that student’s life and future ministry.

The new cross-cultural internship aspect of the World Ministries program is just part of the experiential learning experience provided by the SAGU missions department.  There is also an established network of weekend ministries (Frontline Ministries) and short-term missions exposure (Contact trips) as well as the Engage program, which is a similar attempt to weld together the academic and practical.

Experiential learning gives students field experience, enabling them to get their hands dirty with real issues, be exposed longer term to an effective practitioner, and “learn in order to do” rather than “learn in order to know.”  “The degree will look the same,” said Watson, “but the student will see differently and will have a better understanding of what will be required of a career missionary.”

“I fully expect this to become the norm in missions training,” Watson commented.  “While the requirements are far more stringent, this generation is ready for a dose of reality; they want a challenge and they want to learn in tandem with doing.  This program offers them that possibility.”