The School of Equipping operates in partnership with The Urban Ministry Institute, under the parental organization, World Impact, Inc. World Impact, Inc. is a Christian missions organization committed to facilitating church-planting movements by evangelizing, equipping, and empowering the unchurched urban poor. World Impact ministers cross-culturally to people unreached by the gospel of Jesus Christ through evangelism, follow-up, discipleship and indigenous church planting. The Urban Ministry Institute is a non-denominational, evangelical training center that exists to equip leaders for the urban church, especially among the poor, in order to advance the Kingdom of God. The institute exists to equip leaders who are serving and investing in others through continued development of lay and pastoral leaders who can effectively disciple others. “As a training center dedicated to honoring and glorifying God in all we do, TUMI is unashamedly committed to academic excellence and quality leadership education. Every resource and program represent our commitment to excellence and God-honoring leadership education that rivals the most rigorous and prestigious programs today. Nevertheless, we have deliberately chosen to remain non-accredited. Why? To be sure, accreditation in most cases and venues is commendable and beneficial for any leadership training center, affording its students the credibility of accredited studies and the ability to transfer credit to other sister institutions. However, because many of exorbitant prices and academic standards preclude the involvement of many urban leaders from attending, accreditation actually severely limits the student pool of prospective students for ministry education, and effectively shuts out the vast majority of urban applicants in many of our traditional seminaries and Christian liberal arts schools. In light of these unfortunate circumstances, TUMI has elected to remain unaccredited, not as a cover for supposed mediocrity, but as our way of ensuring that all of our premiere programs and resources can be accessed by any urban leader who is serving their churches and advancing the Kingdom of Christ in the city, and who also may not have either the large sums of funds or the academic background to qualify for that training.” TUMI Official Statement on Accreditation The Case for and Against Accreditation “In a real sense, the process of academic accreditation was designed to protect students from fraudulent and unethical diploma mills that were suspect academically and criminal ethically. Who among us has not heard of a get-certified-quick kind of enterprise promising a Ph.D. through a phone call and a money deposit? The Urban Ministry Institute affirms and embraces the legitimacy of the various credentialing associations, and believe them in the main to be helpful, responsible, and credible enterprises that move forward responsible scholarship and higher education. Nevertheless, TUMI has deliberately chosen to operate as a non-accredited training institution. This decision in no way speaks of any desire to ignore traditional academic and ministry standards for its educational programming. Again, we have chosen not to participate in formal accreditation processes in order to remain available to as many students as possible. While accreditation establishes strong criteria to ensure educational and professional excellence, the process can both unknowingly and unfortunately eliminate or exclude many deserving potential students who, because of lack of funds or poor educational background, become disqualified from the leadership education offers. Although we are not accredited, we do affiliate with the Association of Biblical Higher Education, a fine accrediting association of schools and seminaries. Furthermore, we also partner with some accredited liberal arts schools and seminaries where our faculty teach and offer courses. Also, select TUMI courses taken for credit can be transferred to an accredited seminary which recognizes them for graduate level credit.” TUMI Official Statement on Accreditation

 

The School of Equipping, a satellite of The Urban Ministry Institute, is committed to training and developing quality Christian ministry gifts and leaders.