Smiling woman in glasses browsing books on a wooden library shelf

Accessible

A $40 MILLION CAMPAIGN COMMITMENT

Because a calling should not be limited by where someone lives.

For a student balancing ministry, work, family, and financial responsibilities, the distance between a sense of vocation and the opportunity for theological formation can be immense. A gifted leader may have everything a community needs except the resources to pursue an education. Another may live thousands of miles from Evanston, able to bring knowledge and experience that would enrich any classroom, but unable to bridge that geographic gap.

Too often, the circumstances of a person's life determine not only whether they can pursue theological education, but the quality and depth of the formation available to them.

Garrett believes something more is possible.

Equipped

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Empowered

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Formed in Faith

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Shaped by Community

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Ready to Lead

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Equipped ✳︎ Empowered ✳︎ Formed in Faith ✳︎ Shaped by Community ✳︎ Ready to Lead ✳︎

A Calling Answered. A World Changed.

Four people sit and talk on a grassy campus lawn beneath large leafy trees.

A Garrett education does not end with the person who receives it.

It lives in the congregation who charts a future beyond its present challenges. In the hospital room where a chaplain brings presence and compassion. In the classroom where a teacher helps a student discover a sense of purpose. In the community where a leader creates space for people to listen, reconcile, and act together.

These are the lives touched by theological education. They are the reason access matters.

When Garrett removes a financial barrier, strengthens a learning experience, and makes formation possible across distance, the results transcend enrollment statistics.

Leadership takes root where it is needed.

A community facing uncertainty finds a leader prepared to help it move forward.

That is the extraordinary reach when you make a gift to “Accessible.”

Scholarships make the decision to pursue theological education possible. Broadly purposed student support can give learners greater freedom to answer a call without assuming burdens that compromise their future ministry or service.

Formation experiences make that education whole. Support for retreats, immersion, travel, clinical and contextual learning can bring students into meaningful relationship with faculty, fellow learners, congregations, and communities across the world.

Investment in academic excellence makes that promise sustainable. Reliable technology, accessible scholarly resources, responsive student services, and the ability to engage excellent instructors across contexts can ensure that Garrett's commitment to formation is matched by the quality of the experience it provides.

Graduation ceremony inside a church with colorful stained-glass windows, hanging lanterns, and graduates in purple caps and gowns.

An Excellent Education Requires Access and Formation

Opening the door to theological education is only the beginning.

A scholarship by itself does not offer the resources and experiences that nurture spiritual formation. Books, essential technologies, travel for in-person intensives, and a contextual education site are just as necessary. Otherwise, a learner can attend every class virtually but lack the wisdom formed through gathering, worship, reflection, internships, and shared experience.

Access without full participation is an incomplete promise.

At Garrett, theological education is more than the transmission of knowledge. We train leaders who can bring rigorous scholarship, spiritual depth, humility, and courage into complex social circumstances.

Abundant Spirit will help Garrett make those experiences possible for every student. Philanthropy does more than remove the obstacles in their path, it deepens their formation.

As Garrett becomes more accessible, its learning community becomes richer. Students bring new questions, languages, experiences, and perspectives into shared study. Faculty encounter new contexts for scholarship and teaching. The entire institution is strengthened.

Access and excellence are not competing ambitions. At Garrett, each makes the other possible.

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The Classroom of the Future Arrives in the Present

Swiftly evolving technologies make hybrid instruction more effective than ever before. While exact designs for our new classrooms will be determined by specialists who implement the best of what’s available, this illustration offers examples for how we can bring in-person and remote students into closer communion.

Illustrated trauma-informed care presentation in a modern conference room, with a diverse audience, video participants, and a cityscape visible through the windows.

Learning Eye to Eye: Adding multiple video displays ensures that more remote students are simultaneously visible, facilitating better integration.

A Nearer Focus: New camera, mounted in strategic locations, can zoom in on individual speakers, creating emotional proximity for distance learners.

Loud and Clear: Microphones improve remote audio and signal cameras to focus on the speaker.

In Their Voices

Brianna Garrett | MDiv

I didn’t grow up in church. The last election season had me shaken, and I wanted to find community for myself and my kids. I’ll never forget the first time I worshipped at my local UMC. The sermon was on being beloved, and I wondered, “Why am I crying?” Six months later I was baptized and started having wild dreams about going to seminary. When I attended annual conference and saw the ordination service, I sobbed with certainty, “That’ll be me one day.” I want to be a pastor because everyone deserves to know they're loved.
Somehow, I found the laity discernment cohort. I had just left domestic violence; was living on my own. I have a 15-year-old and a 5-year-old, the idea of uprooting my family is a non-starter. Garrett met me where I am. I got into the MDiv program but was certain I couldn’t afford it. Bam—75% scholarship. My whole life I was told, “you’re not good enough;” found love was always transactional. Now I’m going to help other people have the world-changing experience I had.
Nathan Rodriguez | MAPCC

I spent my life in very unaffirming church spaces. As I became more aware of my own sexuality, I started questioning, “what’s happening here?” It finally came to a head a few years ago when I decided this was not sustainable for my mental health and found a job as the music director at Normal First United Methodist Church. My pastors helped me discern my greater sense of call: I want to support queer people who struggle with church trauma and remedy relationships between church spaces and LGBTQIA+ folks. In the future, I hope to create a non-profit that provides free counseling to queer people who suffered church hurt.
It's such a huge blessing to receive this scholarship. Five years ago, if you told me that seminary was even a possibility, I would have laughed in your face. But doors just kept opening. The accessibility alone is tremendous. I'm primarily online, but I was on campus for an intensive this summer and can see that happening more in my future.
Oluseye Fakinlede | MATM

I actually inquired about pursuing ordination back in Nigeria after my undergraduate studies, but I was wrestling with internal questions about my identity and my faith—whether I would have to hide who I was to pursue ministry. But one of the ways I can support people is to let the world know how it is to be someone who loves differently. That level of personal acceptance—that's the reason why God must have brought me here to the States. Just as God placed this desire for the priestly vocation within my heart, He led me to the Episcopal Church—which is thankfully affirming—where I can be honest and answer that call.
I also have a master’s in journalism and would love to serve people with my words. There’s a reason for the detours in my life. God willing, if I become a priest, writing will continue to be part of that witness. Because when experiences are put on paper, it's a living thing that goes across the globe, and can help whoever finds it.
Jame Menning | MAPCC

We lived my husband’s journey of cancer since 2018. In that process, we met chaplains at the institutions where my husband was receiving treatment. When I think about what we needed then, it was a compassionate presence in the middle of the storm. Chaplaincy creates space for the person and all the relationships and support systems that are connected to their healing. It made the non-physical realities we were facing feel valued, offered a more holistic view of life and healing.
In spaces facilitated by these kinds of caregivers, I began to see in myself gifts that led me to consider a ministry of presence. I have empathy, I want to do this, but I need more. Now, I’m glad to formally learn these skills. If I really want to be someone who can accompany people from all backgrounds, I need to enrich my education by being in a diverse setting. When I visited, I saw that MAPCC faculty represent perspectives and lived experiences from four different continents. I thought, “This is where I want to answer the call and become a chaplain.”

One Garrett.
Many places.
Full participation.

Imagine a Garrett classroom where the conversation begins in Evanston and continues in Zimbabwe, India, Latin America, and Korea.

Students bring their congregations’ and communities’ questions into conversation with faculty scholarship and the lived experience of peers across the world. A challenge encountered in one context becomes an opportunity for shared learning in another. Ideas are tested against different histories, cultures, and expressions of Christian life.

And in-person formation transcends a single physical location.

Faculty and students gather for teaching, immersion, and formation in the communities where Garrett's partners live and serve. Students who begin their education at a distance have opportunities to learn in person alongside colleagues and practitioners. Those who study in Evanston experience an unparalleled education.

This is not theological education exported from one institution to the rest of the world.

It is theological education birthed through global relationships.

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