In accordance with the newest statistics from the Nationwide Middle for Schooling Statistics (NCES), there are simply over three million graduate college students in the US. Practically 75,000 of those college students (2%) are enrolled in a seminary, which is a kind of graduate college that gives primarily theological levels. That quantity might not look like quite a bit, however the share of medical and regulation enrollees is simply barely greater (3% and three.6%, respectively).
On this article, we’ll take a deeper take a look at graduate theological schooling in the US, together with a brief information to seminaries, the most important faculties, and up to date traits.
A brief information to seminaries
The quantity & varieties of seminaries
In the US, there are presently 245 seminaries accredited by the Fee on Accrediting of The Affiliation of Theological Colleges (ATS). Beneath you may see a graphical breakdown of members by what ATS calls an establishment’s “ecclesial household”: evangelical Protestant, mainline Protestant, Roman Catholic/Orthodox, and Jewish.
A majority of US seminaries (57%) are freestanding, which suggests they don’t seem to be embedded inside an undergraduate establishment. The remaining faculties that are linked to a different establishment usually function because the graduate theological college of a Christian college, or as a faculty of divinity or division of theology inside a complete college. The 2 largest examples of such embedded faculties are Liberty Theological Seminary and Talbot Faculty of Theology, that are linked to Liberty College and Biola College, respectively.
Seminary diploma choices
The flagship diploma at most seminaries is the grasp of divinity (MDiv), which supplies coaching targeted on management or service in church and different ministry settings.
ATS additionally approves all kinds of grasp of arts (MA) or equally named levels (almost 250 totally different choices) that permit college students to deal with a specific self-discipline, similar to Christian schooling or management.
The ultimate sort of grasp’s-level diploma provided at seminaries is a grasp of theology (ThM) or grasp of sacred theology (STM), each of that are designed for college students who’ve already accomplished a theological diploma (often an MDiv) and wish extra in-depth coaching, usually in preparation for doctoral research.
On the doctoral stage, there are three primary classes of packages that considerably mirror what’s provided on the grasp’s stage. First, the physician of ministry (DMin) supplies superior coaching for management and repair in church buildings and different ministry settings.
For many who would love superior coaching for extra particular areas of service, many seminaries provide a wide range of physician of self-discipline levels, with the most typical being the physician of schooling (EdD), physician of instructional ministry (DEdMin), and physician of intercultural research (DICS).
Lastly, some seminaries provide superior coaching for instructing and analysis via a physician of philosophy (PhD) or physician of theology (ThD) program.
How seminary enrollment is tracked
There are two metrics generally used to explain scholar enrollment at seminaries. The primary is headcount, which refers back to the variety of college students enrolled at any given time (1 scholar = 1 headcount). As famous initially of this text, complete headcount was just below 75,000 college students for the 2024–2025 tutorial yr.
The opposite solution to describe scholar enrollment is full-time equivalency (FTE), which ATS calculates by dividing the whole variety of credit score hours taken at a faculty by twelve. So a seminary with 100 college students who’re all finding out full-time (twelve credit score hours per semester) would thus have an FTE that can be 100. However a faculty with 100 college students who’re primarily finding out part-time would have a a lot decrease FTE.
Right here’s an enrollment abstract from the 2024–2025 tutorial yr for the seminaries enrolling a minimum of a thousand college students.
The highest 5 largest seminaries
Here’s a extra detailed take a look at the highest 5 seminaries based mostly on headcount. I’ve purposely restricted the knowledge offered to ease readability, however extra datapoints about every establishment might be discovered on its web site or on the ATS web site.
1. Liberty Theological Seminary
- Location: Lynchburg, VA
- Based: 1973
- Non secular affiliation: Evangelical Protestant (Baptist)
- 2024 headcount: 6,168
- Headcount change since 2019: +17%
Liberty supplies Logos to its college students via a Logos for Schooling partnership.
2. The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary
- Location: Louisville, KY
- Based: 1859
- Non secular affiliation: Evangelical Protestant (Southern Baptist)
- 2024 headcount: 3,371
- Headcount change since 2019: +1%
The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary supplies Logos to its college students via a Logos for Schooling partnership.
3. Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary
- Location: Kansas Metropolis, MO
- Based: 1957
- Non secular affiliation: Evangelical Protestant (Southern Baptist)
- 2024 headcount: 2,909
- Headcount change since 2019: +28%
4. Dallas Theological Seminary
- Location: Dallas, TX
- Based: 1924
- Non secular affiliation: Evangelical Protestant (non-denominational)
- 2024 headcount: 2,609
- Headcount change since 2019: +8%
Dallas Theological Seminary supplies Logos to its college students via a Logos for Schooling partnership.
5. Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary
- Location: Fort Price, TX
- Based: 1908
- Non secular affiliation: Evangelical Protestant (Southern Baptist)
- 2024 headcount: 2,278
- Headcount change since 2019: -8%
Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary supplies Logos to its college students via a Logos for Schooling partnership.
5 latest seminary traits
Tendencies in 5 areas spotlight some impactful seminary shifts which have occurred over the previous twenty years.
1. On-line schooling
Ten years in the past, solely about 30 p.c of seminary college students took a number of lessons via distance schooling choices (on-line or in individual at an off-campus location). At this time, that quantity is nearer to 70 p.c, with the overwhelming majority of “distance” college students finding out on-line.
The pandemic definitely contributed to this shift, however many seminaries had already begun transferring towards extra on-line choices after ATS modified its accreditation requirements in 2013 to permit total levels to be accomplished on-line. At present, solely twenty-six ATS member faculties in the US provide programs solely in individual on their campus.
2. Shorter grasp of divinity (MDiv) packages
From the institution of the earliest American seminaries over 2 hundred years in the past via the start of the twenty-first century, the popular mannequin for strong ministry preparation was a three-year program of graduate research following the completion of an undergraduate diploma. The earliest accreditation pointers (1936) stipulated that this credential—which ultimately turned often known as the grasp of divinity (MDiv)—ought to require a minimal of three years of coaching consisting of a minimum of two semesters annually.
Although a strict credit-hour requirement was by no means codified, the widespread interpretation of the rule led to most seminaries providing an MDiv requiring a minimal of ninety credit score hours. This remained the usual size of the MDiv till the late-twentieth century, when seminaries started to re-interpret the accreditation guideline to permit for packages requiring as few as seventy-two credit score hours. ATS ultimately up to date its requirements in 2010 to explicitly set up that decrease threshold because the minimal permissible size for an MDiv. Now about two-thirds of ATS member faculties provide an MDiv requiring fewer than ninety credit score hours.
The push towards shorter MDiv packages has virtually definitely been an effort designed primarily to stem the steep decline in that program’s total enrollment over the previous twenty years. In 2005, American seminaries collectively enrolled simply over 32,000 MDiv college students. Twenty years later, that quantity had dropped to 24,633, the bottom MDiv enrollment since 1991, when there have been eighty fewer member faculties in the US.
3. Elevated enrollment in grasp of arts packages
Because the variety of MDiv college students has decreased, enrollment in grasp of arts (MA) packages has skyrocketed. Particularly, there are almost eight thousand extra MA college students than a decade in the past, with these college students comprising about 37 p.c of complete seminary enrollment in the US.
There are a number of causes for this progress, however a main contributor is that the sheer variety of obtainable packages has grown considerably. Many seminaries have added new packages to their current MA choices in areas similar to counseling and intercultural research. There has additionally been a dramatic enhance within the variety of faculties which have begun to supply MA packages for ministry preparation. In consequence, for the primary time within the ATS’s historical past, the variety of MA college students throughout all member faculties surpassed the variety of MDiv college students in 2022.
4. Scholar variety
In comparison with twenty years in the past, the present group of seminary enrollees is considerably extra numerous. Though white college students nonetheless comprise a majority of all seminary enrollees (56%), that share is significantly smaller than in 2003 (75%) or 2013 (68%).
Contributing to this progress in non-white enrollment is the truth that the mixed inhabitants of Asian and Hispanic college students has greater than doubled during the last twenty years.
5. A focus of enrollment in massive evangelical seminaries
The common headcount at seminaries in the US is 303 college students, however what’s fascinating is that greater than 75 p.c of seminaries (191) have an enrollment under that determine. That’s as a result of 45 p.c of scholars are enrolled within the sixteen faculties listed on this article which have a headcount of multiple thousand. In different phrases, almost half of all scholar enrollment is concentrated in simply 7 p.c of seminaries, all of that are evangelical Protestant.
Logos for Schooling
Logos is probably the most superior platform for finding out God’s Phrase and accessing scholarly sources: anytime, anyplace, and multi functional place—for all times. Our tutorial options assist your college students with textbook supply and a customized useful resource library delivered via your LMS.
Logos is a wonderful software for ministry placing a complete library on the disposal of each person and making probably the most severe and sensible instruments for Bible research accessible immediately and all the time. Logos is unprecedented and a fantastic reward to those that will research the Bible on this technology.
—Albert Mohler
Expertise our industry-leading assist as you convey the ability of Logos to your college, college students, and administration. Begin equipping your college students with Logos.
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In accordance with the newest statistics from the Nationwide Middle for Schooling Statistics (NCES), there are simply over three million graduate college students in the US. Practically 75,000 of those college students (2%) are enrolled in a seminary, which is a kind of graduate college that gives primarily theological levels. That quantity might not look like quite a bit, however the share of medical and regulation enrollees is simply barely greater (3% and three.6%, respectively).
On this article, we’ll take a deeper take a look at graduate theological schooling in the US, together with a brief information to seminaries, the most important faculties, and up to date traits.
A brief information to seminaries
The quantity & varieties of seminaries
In the US, there are presently 245 seminaries accredited by the Fee on Accrediting of The Affiliation of Theological Colleges (ATS). Beneath you may see a graphical breakdown of members by what ATS calls an establishment’s “ecclesial household”: evangelical Protestant, mainline Protestant, Roman Catholic/Orthodox, and Jewish.
A majority of US seminaries (57%) are freestanding, which suggests they don’t seem to be embedded inside an undergraduate establishment. The remaining faculties that are linked to a different establishment usually function because the graduate theological college of a Christian college, or as a faculty of divinity or division of theology inside a complete college. The 2 largest examples of such embedded faculties are Liberty Theological Seminary and Talbot Faculty of Theology, that are linked to Liberty College and Biola College, respectively.
Seminary diploma choices
The flagship diploma at most seminaries is the grasp of divinity (MDiv), which supplies coaching targeted on management or service in church and different ministry settings.
ATS additionally approves all kinds of grasp of arts (MA) or equally named levels (almost 250 totally different choices) that permit college students to deal with a specific self-discipline, similar to Christian schooling or management.
The ultimate sort of grasp’s-level diploma provided at seminaries is a grasp of theology (ThM) or grasp of sacred theology (STM), each of that are designed for college students who’ve already accomplished a theological diploma (often an MDiv) and wish extra in-depth coaching, usually in preparation for doctoral research.
On the doctoral stage, there are three primary classes of packages that considerably mirror what’s provided on the grasp’s stage. First, the physician of ministry (DMin) supplies superior coaching for management and repair in church buildings and different ministry settings.
For many who would love superior coaching for extra particular areas of service, many seminaries provide a wide range of physician of self-discipline levels, with the most typical being the physician of schooling (EdD), physician of instructional ministry (DEdMin), and physician of intercultural research (DICS).
Lastly, some seminaries provide superior coaching for instructing and analysis via a physician of philosophy (PhD) or physician of theology (ThD) program.
How seminary enrollment is tracked
There are two metrics generally used to explain scholar enrollment at seminaries. The primary is headcount, which refers back to the variety of college students enrolled at any given time (1 scholar = 1 headcount). As famous initially of this text, complete headcount was just below 75,000 college students for the 2024–2025 tutorial yr.
The opposite solution to describe scholar enrollment is full-time equivalency (FTE), which ATS calculates by dividing the whole variety of credit score hours taken at a faculty by twelve. So a seminary with 100 college students who’re all finding out full-time (twelve credit score hours per semester) would thus have an FTE that can be 100. However a faculty with 100 college students who’re primarily finding out part-time would have a a lot decrease FTE.
Right here’s an enrollment abstract from the 2024–2025 tutorial yr for the seminaries enrolling a minimum of a thousand college students.
The highest 5 largest seminaries
Here’s a extra detailed take a look at the highest 5 seminaries based mostly on headcount. I’ve purposely restricted the knowledge offered to ease readability, however extra datapoints about every establishment might be discovered on its web site or on the ATS web site.
1. Liberty Theological Seminary
- Location: Lynchburg, VA
- Based: 1973
- Non secular affiliation: Evangelical Protestant (Baptist)
- 2024 headcount: 6,168
- Headcount change since 2019: +17%
Liberty supplies Logos to its college students via a Logos for Schooling partnership.
2. The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary
- Location: Louisville, KY
- Based: 1859
- Non secular affiliation: Evangelical Protestant (Southern Baptist)
- 2024 headcount: 3,371
- Headcount change since 2019: +1%
The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary supplies Logos to its college students via a Logos for Schooling partnership.
3. Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary
- Location: Kansas Metropolis, MO
- Based: 1957
- Non secular affiliation: Evangelical Protestant (Southern Baptist)
- 2024 headcount: 2,909
- Headcount change since 2019: +28%
4. Dallas Theological Seminary
- Location: Dallas, TX
- Based: 1924
- Non secular affiliation: Evangelical Protestant (non-denominational)
- 2024 headcount: 2,609
- Headcount change since 2019: +8%
Dallas Theological Seminary supplies Logos to its college students via a Logos for Schooling partnership.
5. Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary
- Location: Fort Price, TX
- Based: 1908
- Non secular affiliation: Evangelical Protestant (Southern Baptist)
- 2024 headcount: 2,278
- Headcount change since 2019: -8%
Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary supplies Logos to its college students via a Logos for Schooling partnership.
5 latest seminary traits
Tendencies in 5 areas spotlight some impactful seminary shifts which have occurred over the previous twenty years.
1. On-line schooling
Ten years in the past, solely about 30 p.c of seminary college students took a number of lessons via distance schooling choices (on-line or in individual at an off-campus location). At this time, that quantity is nearer to 70 p.c, with the overwhelming majority of “distance” college students finding out on-line.
The pandemic definitely contributed to this shift, however many seminaries had already begun transferring towards extra on-line choices after ATS modified its accreditation requirements in 2013 to permit total levels to be accomplished on-line. At present, solely twenty-six ATS member faculties in the US provide programs solely in individual on their campus.
2. Shorter grasp of divinity (MDiv) packages
From the institution of the earliest American seminaries over 2 hundred years in the past via the start of the twenty-first century, the popular mannequin for strong ministry preparation was a three-year program of graduate research following the completion of an undergraduate diploma. The earliest accreditation pointers (1936) stipulated that this credential—which ultimately turned often known as the grasp of divinity (MDiv)—ought to require a minimal of three years of coaching consisting of a minimum of two semesters annually.
Although a strict credit-hour requirement was by no means codified, the widespread interpretation of the rule led to most seminaries providing an MDiv requiring a minimal of ninety credit score hours. This remained the usual size of the MDiv till the late-twentieth century, when seminaries started to re-interpret the accreditation guideline to permit for packages requiring as few as seventy-two credit score hours. ATS ultimately up to date its requirements in 2010 to explicitly set up that decrease threshold because the minimal permissible size for an MDiv. Now about two-thirds of ATS member faculties provide an MDiv requiring fewer than ninety credit score hours.
The push towards shorter MDiv packages has virtually definitely been an effort designed primarily to stem the steep decline in that program’s total enrollment over the previous twenty years. In 2005, American seminaries collectively enrolled simply over 32,000 MDiv college students. Twenty years later, that quantity had dropped to 24,633, the bottom MDiv enrollment since 1991, when there have been eighty fewer member faculties in the US.
3. Elevated enrollment in grasp of arts packages
Because the variety of MDiv college students has decreased, enrollment in grasp of arts (MA) packages has skyrocketed. Particularly, there are almost eight thousand extra MA college students than a decade in the past, with these college students comprising about 37 p.c of complete seminary enrollment in the US.
There are a number of causes for this progress, however a main contributor is that the sheer variety of obtainable packages has grown considerably. Many seminaries have added new packages to their current MA choices in areas similar to counseling and intercultural research. There has additionally been a dramatic enhance within the variety of faculties which have begun to supply MA packages for ministry preparation. In consequence, for the primary time within the ATS’s historical past, the variety of MA college students throughout all member faculties surpassed the variety of MDiv college students in 2022.
4. Scholar variety
In comparison with twenty years in the past, the present group of seminary enrollees is considerably extra numerous. Though white college students nonetheless comprise a majority of all seminary enrollees (56%), that share is significantly smaller than in 2003 (75%) or 2013 (68%).
Contributing to this progress in non-white enrollment is the truth that the mixed inhabitants of Asian and Hispanic college students has greater than doubled during the last twenty years.
5. A focus of enrollment in massive evangelical seminaries
The common headcount at seminaries in the US is 303 college students, however what’s fascinating is that greater than 75 p.c of seminaries (191) have an enrollment under that determine. That’s as a result of 45 p.c of scholars are enrolled within the sixteen faculties listed on this article which have a headcount of multiple thousand. In different phrases, almost half of all scholar enrollment is concentrated in simply 7 p.c of seminaries, all of that are evangelical Protestant.
Logos for Schooling
Logos is probably the most superior platform for finding out God’s Phrase and accessing scholarly sources: anytime, anyplace, and multi functional place—for all times. Our tutorial options assist your college students with textbook supply and a customized useful resource library delivered via your LMS.
Logos is a wonderful software for ministry placing a complete library on the disposal of each person and making probably the most severe and sensible instruments for Bible research accessible immediately and all the time. Logos is unprecedented and a fantastic reward to those that will research the Bible on this technology.
—Albert Mohler
Expertise our industry-leading assist as you convey the ability of Logos to your college, college students, and administration. Begin equipping your college students with Logos.
Prompt sources
Associated articles
