Annual banquet for Dempster scholars announced
9/21/1998 News media contact: Linda Green · (615) 742-5470 · Nashville, Tenn By Kathy Gilbert* NASHVILLE, Tenn. (UMNS) -- Six doctoral candidates have become the latest recipients of Dempster Graduate Fellowships, adding their names to a growing list of scholars who have made their mark on United Methodist higher education.
Since 1954, the Dempster Graduate Fellowships have helped graduate students move toward careers in theological education, and many have gone on to become seminary and university presidents, professors, and pastors.
Past and present Dempster Graduate Fellowship recipients will be honored at the first banquet of Dempster fellows on Nov. 21. The event is being held in conjunction with the American Academy of Religion and the Society for Biblical Literature, which are meeting in Orlando, Fla. Organizers plan on making the banquet an annual event.
"These recipients represent the best of United Methodist intellectual thought and scholarship," said the Rev. John E. Harnish, a staff executive over the Division of Ordained Ministry at the United Methodist General Board of Higher Education and Ministry. The division administers the awards, and money is made available through the Ministerial Education Fund.
"The purpose of this gathering is to recognize the contributions these recipients have made to United Methodist higher education and to create an ongoing forum for Dempster fellows," said Robert Feaster, chairman of the Dempster Endowment Committee. Thomas A. Langford, 1955-56 Dempster recipient and former provost of Duke University, will be the keynote speaker for the Nov. 21 banquet.
"Receiving the Dempster award was a great turning point in my life, and I am extremely grateful," said William Mallard Jr., one of the first to receive the scholarship in 1954. "I had just reached the point where the matter of resources was a great question mark. The award saved the day for me."
Mallard went on to finish his degree and has been a professor of church history at Candler School of Theology for 41 years.
"The Dempster scholarship opened my eyes so I could see my work and my future roles in the public sphere," said Sunja Choi-Chong, one of the 1998-99 recipients and a Ph.D. candidate at Chicago Theological Seminary. "The Dempster scholarship reassured me of my calling and responsibilities that I felt when I first made the decision to study theology."
The Dempster fellowships have helped prepare a distinguished group of people who are committed to both the church and the academy, Harnish said.
Former recipients include: Donald E. Messer, president of Iliff School of Theology, 1996-68 recipient; Rebecca Chopp, provost at Emory University, 1980-81 recipient; Karen Y. Collier, assistant professor at Fisk University, 1975-76 recipient; F. Thomas Trotter, former president of Alaska Pacific University, 1955-56 recipient; and John W. Z. Kurewa, first vice chancellor of Africa University, 1972-73 recipient.
As part of the annual gathering, a collection of dissertations from Dempster fellows will be on permanent display at the Laskey Library in the Scarritt-Bennett Center in Nashville. A directory of Dempster fellows is also being developed for the banquet.
The awards are named for John Dempster, a 19th-century Methodist preacher who helped found three seminaries related to the denomination. The fellowships are "a significant commitment to future United Methodist biblical and theological scholarship," Harnish said. There have been 190 recipients of the fellowships since 1954.
Selection for the Dempster award is based on intellectual competence, academic achievement, promise of usefulness in teaching careers, personal qualities, and clarity of spiritual purpose and commitment.
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*Gilbert is a staff member in the Office of Interpretation at the Board of Higher Education and Ministry.
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