INSTITUTIONAL PARTNERSHIPS/COLLABORATIONS

In terms of institutional partnership, there have been various existing relations between particular member schools of the GTU and theological institutions in Asia. Most of these are long-standing though informal exchanges of both faculty and students going in both directions (that is, from the GTU to Asia as well as from Asia to the GTU).

The group identified five categories of institutional partnership as future foci. They are: a) relations with theological associations in Asia; b) exchanges of faculty and students; c) the isolation of Asians and Pacific Islanders working in North America; d) IASACT; and e) existing programs in GTU member schools.

 The group made a number of proposals:

·        make proposals to particular groups within the American Academy of Religion (AAR) and the Society of Biblical Literature (SBL) to do a session or sessions in 2008 and/or beyond that will feature scholarship by scholars from Asia, including the possibility for the guild to help fund travel for these scholars

·        GTU make an official request that CATS officially invite GTU faculty members to be part of the next CATS meeting

·        expand the partnership between the Pacific School of Religion and the Association of Theological Schools in Indonesia by opening the teaching opportunity to faculty of any GTU member school, and bringing a few GTU students to take the course in Indonesia, with costs being the responsibility of the GTU member school to which the faculty and the students belong

·        cultivate relations between the GTU and the Loyola School of Theology in the Philippines and explore future exchange possibilities

·        pursue the “cross-Pacific” team-teaching model (with a GTU faculty member teaching a course with a scholar from Asia) in Korea, Philippines, and Samoa

·        cultivate relations between GTU and regions of Asia that have been underrepresented in the Partnerships Project thus far 

·        pursue exchange between theological institutions within Asia

·        write a grant to bring together North American scholars of Asian and Pacific/Oceania heritage to establish venues of exchange and collaboration 

·        develop the next phase of IASACT in a direction comparable to the Wabash Center for Teaching and Learning in the U.S. 

·        explore and execute better coordination of existing programs located within different member schools of the GTU