Fostering Quality in Developing Seminary Research

By Teófilo Correa

Research is a core component in graduate education. It is like “the gospel” or the “good news” that a university offers through various platforms to the academic community and the world in general. So in scholarly terms, doing research is a practice that keeps an academic institution alive.

The AIIAS Seminary, a school that offers theological education, embraces the AIIAS goal of fostering research excellence. Both professors and students are immersed in searching for new methods, exploring new perspectives, and suggesting new postulates in their vast field of knowledge.

Research is a lifetime activity for professors on their area of expertise. It implies the mastery of an area of study and the acknowledgment of new contributions and the current discussion in the field. Teaching offers professors another essential venue in doing research. As lecturers, they need to prepare lectures for their classes. Research projects can provide the best material to share in the classroom. On the other hand, most courses require students to write a term paper. What an excellent opportunity to instill good research practices in junior scholars! Here, professors provide guidelines on methods and an appropriate exploration of a subject for a particular course.

Graduate education expects students to contribute knowledge in a particular area of study. Therefore, it should be a key item in the justification of a research proposal. In the end, students need to write a final report of their research. That report is presented in the form of a thesis or a dissertation. In doing this, students need research mentors. They need a doktorvater to help them to become experts in a field of study. Research advisors have a chance to impart opportune direction in the research as they provide the respective feedback to the papers. This is a necessary process in the research stage as the chapters must meet the research standards and win the final approval of dissertation committee members.

In addition to what is mentioned above, professors are leading international research projects for academic and professional societies. Furthermore, students and professors often present their research in international and local venues, and publish books, book chapters, or articles in leading journals. That is another evidence of the quality in developing research in our institution.

We can list other ways in which the AIIAS Seminary promotes research. For instance, the investment has been made to provide a complete and modern library collection in various formats so researchers could access the information easily. However, the most important contribution, in my view, is the worldview of the researchers. The starting point in doing research is the fact that the Bible is the revealed word of God and that even though its content is rooted in ancient times, its postulates and principles are still relevant to society nowadays. Faith and learning are good companions for all research enterprises.

Teófilo Correa, PhD, is a professor of Old Testament from the AIIAS Seminary Biblical Studies Department. He comes from Peru.