SALISBURY — Dr. Vergel Lattimore, president of Hood Theological Seminary, was elected to the Board of the Association of Theological Schools in the United States and Canada (ATS) at its biennial meeting in Pittsburgh last month. He will serve a four-year term which may be renewed at the biennial meeting in 2020. Other new board members include Doris Garcia of Evangelical Seminary of Puerto Rico, and Mark Young of Denver Seminary.

Hood Theological Seminary was first accredited by the ATS in 1998 for 5 years and its accreditation was reaffirmed in 2003 and in 2013, each time for an additional 10 years – the maximum period of accreditation granted.

The ATS is a membership organization of graduate schools that conduct post-baccalaureate professional and academic degree programs to educate people for the practice of ministry and for teaching and research in the theological disciplines. The Commission on Accrediting of ATS accredits the schools and approves the degree programs they offer. The purpose of the commission is to contribute to the enhancement and improvement of theological education through accreditation and to collect data from all members for use in accrediting. The current commission membership includes more than 270 graduate theological schools in the United States and Canada who are accredited or candidates for accreditation. The commission is recognized by the United States Secretary of Education and by the Council for Higher Education Accreditation.

ATS membership is open to schools in the Christian and Jewish faiths. The current membership represents the full range of Christian denominations, including schools in mainline and evangelical Protestant and Roman Catholic and Orthodox traditions, as well as multidenominational and nondenominational schools. Schools representing other faiths and other organizations interested in theological education may become affiliates of ATS.

Hood Theological Seminary, located at 1810 Lutheran Synod Drive, is a graduate and professional school sponsored by the A.M.E. Zion Church and approved by the University Senate of the United Methodist Church. Its student body currently comprises of people from many different denominations. As a theological seminary, it provides for the church an educational community in which Christian maturity and ministerial preparation take place together.