PBTS offers online classes for students who are not able to come and live on campus. This allows pastors and church leaders to have quality theological training in the comforts of their ministry location.
Courses are taught by our highly qualified resident professors, SEE Facilitators, and Visiting Faculty from various partner seminaries in the U.S. This gives students a wide variety of teachers and mentors that will help them in their theological and spiritual formation.
What are the Admission Requirements?
For those seeking a degree, the applicant will have to follow the same procedure as that of a resident student as stated on this page.
Interested students may take courses for audit. They will just have to provide basic information about themselves in the Application Forms. However, they will still be required to participate in class and fulfill all the course requirements if they plan to turn the course for credit at a later time.
How long does a course usually take?
All classes are required to have at least 48 contact hours for a 3-unit credit. For synchronous courses (where the professors teaches live, it will be for 16 weeks at 3 hours per week. Asynchrounous classes may take longer or shorter than 16 weeks, depending on the design of the course. However, it can never be longer than 32 weeks.
How is the quality of teaching and learning on this kind of education?
Online learning has gone a long way since its first inception. The techonology now is more advanced that makes it easier for teachers to be creative in content delivery and assessment. Research on Online Pedagogy has brought creative ways of ensuring that the learning experience is at par, if not better, than the traditional classroom setting. Both traditional and online learning face challenges in creating maximum learning for students. However, each of the approach have come up with ways to overcome those challenges.
To ensure the quality of online theological education of PBTS, we adhere to the strict standards set by Quality Matters .
How are the courses taught?
There are a variety of ways courses are taught. This is the strength of online delivery. The use of multimedia is integrated into the content delivery of the course. Audio lectures, videos, slide presentations are just some of the ways content are delivered. Furthermore, the use of ebooks are becoming more and more popular.
Collaboration is also possible in online courses. Students are still able to have substantial discussions and collaborate on learning a particular subject. It can be done asynchronously which allows greater flexibility.
How much time should I allot for a course?
Since the whole course is done for a total of 48 hours, it roughly translates to 3 hours per week. Preparation time is about the same, bringing the total to 6 hours per week. This will give you ample time to absorb and interact with the learning materials.
I'm a technophobe. Is this going to be a problem?
The fact that you are reading this FAQ suggests that you have somehow overcome that. LoL. Don't worry. Everything can be learned. We have put together a series of tutorial videos to help you as you start out your first course. It might look daunting at first, but just hold on. Research have shown that constant exposure and usage will make you more confident in using technology.