Mid-America Baptist Theological Seminary

About

Mid-America Baptist Theological Seminary provides future leaders with the tools and teaching they need to reach their full potential as ambassadors for Christ.

Education

North America

Solutions provided:

Learning Management >

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Founded in 1972 to provide an alternative for seminary training, Mid-America has developed into a premiere institution for theological education. More than 90 percent of Mid-America’s alumni are involved in vocational ministry, with others teaching at seminaries and colleges throughout the world.

Background

Mid-America’s business need was to make its online courses available to students who were scattered nationally and globally. Initially, Mid-America offered a few classes online every year just to meet its accreditation requirements. In order to reach more students and address their needs, the university gradually realized that it would be necessary to update not only the existing online curriculum and platform but also the course design and the virtual presence of the curriculum within the learning management system (LMS). Furthermore, Mid-America wanted to ensure that students would be learning on a platform that was aligned with the school’s brand scheme set by marketing. Above all, the university needed a way to track student progress with the additional programs being offered online.

The Solution

Learning Program Management
Using Remote Learner’s (now a Learning Pool company) Enterprise Learning Intelligence System (ELIS), Mid-America was able to update and maintain the desired level of curriculum within the online programs. ELIS provides tools that support the tracking of student progress for programs offered in an online environment.

Site Design and Development
Mid-America joined up with the design team at Learning Pool to develop a theme and custom design for its online courses. This guaranteed that everything would match the recently completed website overhaul. Mid-America provided the content for the courses, and Learning Pool supplied the course development expertise to ensure that students were learning in an environment that was engaging.

Learning Pool’s Higher Education LMS
Mid-America upgraded its LMS platform to Stream LMS, providing users with seamless access to better features and faster speeds. This allowed the university to support more current online users. Learning Pool’s hosting infrastructure offers scalability, enabling Mid-America’s platform to support more users as its learning programs grow.

The Outcome

Increased Adaptability and Reliability
Now, the entirety of Mid-America’s curriculum is offered online, and the university’s first fully online Master’s degree program will be offered this fall. Results of a recent survey distributed to Mid-America’s staff, faculty, and students showed that the updated platform speed and increased reliability has resulted in extremely positive feedback.

Better Student Engagement and Usability
Student engagement has increased because the coursework is now more interactive. The number of concurrent uses has also risen due to the fact that more learners are now working through the curriculum. In addition, Mid-America is witnessing further growth as a result of custom work that was completed last spring by Learning Pool’s Learning Solutions team.