New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary Relocates to Atlanta
The flooding of the New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary (NOBTS) campus in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina has forced the school to move its classes and operations to its North Georgia Extension Center.
The flooding of the New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary (NOBTS) campus in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina has forced the school to move its classes and operations to its North Georgia Extension Center.
A group of 30 administrators, professors and staff members met at the North Georgia Campus in Decatur, a suburb near Atlanta, on Sept. 1 to work out ways to continue the semester.
“New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary is here to stay and we are getting back to work,” said NOBTS President Chuck Kelley at the meeting. “We will have a semester. We will have a December graduation.”
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Although the NOBTS campus sustained minimal damages to its buildings from the hurricane directly, levees broke and the campus was flooded.
But Kelley said that he expects the main campus to be fully operational in August 2006 and while he along with all of the campus staff, faculty, and students are now displaced, he remains hopeful that some activities will be held on campus as early as January 2006.
“All of us on campus have experienced a tremendous loss, however our students don’t have to lose this semester,” Provost Steve Lemke said. “We are designing options so that every student can complete their scheduled load through this semester.”
According to an Academic Information page posted on the NOBT website, most of the New Orleans campus courses will continue in a 10-week time frame from Oct. 3 through Dec. 16.
There are five possible ways to continue a course: (1) continuing in a class that is transformed into a threaded discussion system (TDS), (2) transferring to an existing Internet course, (3) transferring to an existing extension center course, (4) transferring to an existing Saturday class, or (5) attending an October workshop.
NOBTS residential students can transfer to extension center classes without late fee or drop/add fee but are encouraged to do it quickly since extension classes are already in session. Professors would allow students to make up their work and excuse them from any class meetings they have already missed.
The NOBTS relief task force will be coordinating efforts to set up transferring students with the housing options available.
Students who are taking an Internet course can continue their classes online while students transferring to or adding existing Internet courses will not be charged the usual technology fees.
Both Saturday classes and October classes will continue as scheduled in Atlanta.
Updated information will be posted on the NOBTS website, www.nobts.edu, but due to overwhelming traffic to the site, information on NOBTS will also be posted on www.sbc.net if visitors are unable to access it.
