Focus on the Netherlands: Restart Learning Center

Wednesday, December 3, 2008

Vlaardingen, Netherlands

On Thursday evening, September 11, 12 students and their lecturer gathered in a classroom in the Church of the Nazarene in Vlaardingen, Netherlands, for their first classes of the Spiritual Formation Certificate Programme.

Even though several met for the first time, they were not strangers to each other. They had already interacted with each other on the online discussion board for the course and were now able to connect voices and faces to the words that they had been reading from each other over the Internet.

For European Nazarene College (EuNC), it all started at the district assembly in March of this year when representatives from the district and EuNC explored the possibility of offering the EuNC curriculum as a part-time program in the Netherlands. It was decided to start with the level one program and to develop a hybrid format of online education and traditional class sessions.

Various people worked very hard to plan and recruit students in order to start with the program after the summer. When September classes began at the campus, the first full course also started online in the Netherlands.

For the Netherlands, it had started with a preaching contest, with a full year theological training as first prize. This caused the development of a new curriculum for the Netherlands.

Arthur Snijders, district superintendent of the Netherlands, sees the new willingness of the students to change their lives and priorities as God's confirmation to the many steps taken towards theological training in the last eight years. He expresses a lot of hope for the Dutch District with this new training spirit: "Our prayer is that the Lord will shape through this a new generation of Christian leaders (clergy and laypeople) with discernment. We long for our churches and programs to be well led. But we also pray that an increasing number of gifted laypeople will use theological and biblical training to present Christ in the working world."

Paul Brower is one of the new students answering a call into ministry. His goal is a Christian Ministry Certificate. Compared to secular studies, he appreciates the teaching atmosphere: "The part I most like is that I felt that EuNC, and my lecturers, all have a real interest and commitment towards the students."

Now in November, the students are already busy with their third course. By the end of this academic year, the students will have completed 30 ECTS (European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System), which is half of the first year program at the campus. The total number of students that have participated in the courses so far is 16.

Lecturers come from the Dutch district, the EuNC campus, or from the wider European EuNC faculty.

Class sessions are always limited to Thursday evening until Saturday, allowing the school to bring in teachers from outside the Netherlands. The remaining contact hours happen through the Internet. As much as possible, the same English textbooks are used in the campus program, and for January, a group of campus students with Michelle Satterlee as teacher will go to the Netherlands to have a combined class with the Dutch students. School faculty also hope that at some point, the Dutch students will be able to come to the campus for their intensive class sessions.

It is through these means that EuNC is connecting students and faculty from the various European districts.

"We are thankful for God's working in the Dutch District, for the raising up of new leadership, for communities and churches to be united in a shared mission to reach out in new ways, for exploring new models of education that transform learners, and for EuNC to be a theological and educational resource to the Eurasia Region" said Antonie Holleman, academic dean for EuNC and originally from the Netherlands.
--EuNC "in touch" newsletter

 

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