For many years the Episcopal Church has been active in assisting her Anglican partners by furthering their development through education. There is an old adage which runs: "If you give a person a fish you feed that person for one day, but if you teach a person how to fish you feed a family for a lifetime." Overseas Leadership Training is a program with two parts: The first part provides post-graduate scholarships for students from developing countries to study in their own country or in schools in other developing countries. Known as "South to South" training, this section of the OLT Program not only develops future seminary and theological college instructors, it also financially supports institutions of advanced education around the world.
The second part of the program includes a vetting service performed for the eleven Episcopal seminaries in the United States, whereby applications are screened by the OLT Office and complete documentation is sent on to the Admissions Offices of the seminaries for serious consideration toward scholarship support. The program also provides international transportation for students to study in the U.S. and return home for their annual vacation with their family, relating their experiences to their local Anglican parish, diocese and province. This not only affords the international student access to a master-level degree in an accredited Episcopal seminary—with which that student can become an instructor to countless other students well into the future—it also provides the students and faculty of U.S. seminaries with the valuable and life-enriching experience of cross-cultural exposure.
It is never taken for granted that scholarships and related assistance will be awarded, but the students who are eventually selected are brought forward with the full support of their diocesan bishop and the provincial authority -- often their archbishop -- with the guarantee of placement in their field upon graduation. The home parish, diocese and province also work in partnership with the student and the Episcopal Church, often providing support for a student’s spouse and education for his/her children while that member of the family is in school overseas.
It is certainly not an easy thing to leave one’s familiar environment and travel to a school away from home and often in another country, but for those who have placed their education in that perspective of priority, their ministry potential and service to their church and to the Anglican Communion has been enhanced beyond anything possible locally.
