North Park has served five generations of students and continues to grow in diversity, academic relevance, and Christian commitment. Our Chicago location is a great asset that reflects the School’s global reach and outlook.
After 125 years, we’ve learned how to streamline the process of helping qualified applicants seek admission to North Park and find affordable ways to attend. If you don’t see what you’re looking for on our website, please contact us directly!
North Park offers more than 40 graduate and undergraduate programs in liberal arts, sciences, and professional studies. Classes average 17 students. 84% of our faculty have terminal degrees. Academics here are rigorous and results-oriented.
North Park Theological Seminary prepares you to answer the call to service through theological study, spiritual development, and the formative experiences of living in a community with others on a similar life path.
The Office of Alumni Engagement fosters lifelong connections by engaging alumni with the university and one another in activities, programs, and services that support the university’s mission and alumni needs.
Singers to bring classical and contemporary works to Covenant Congregations over Spring Break
North Park’s University Choir and Chamber Singers perform throughout the year under the direction of Dr. Julia Davids.
CHICAGO (March 4, 2016) — Today, North Park University students, faculty, and staff are putting the final touches on months of choral preparation. Next weekend, they’ll be in the Pacific Northwest, nearly 2000 miles away from campus, on a five-city tour over the course of four days.
North Park’s University Choir and Chamber Singers will tour the Pacific Northwest over spring break, March 12–15. Forty-one students, from undergraduate and graduate music programs, in addition to several non-music majors or minors, will make stops at six Evangelical Covenant Church congregations and a Covenant retirement community in Portland, Ore.; Mercer Island, Wash.; Seattle, Wash.; Mount Vernon, Wash.; and Bellevue, Wash.
The tour, titled “Be the Light,” will feature a diverse array of both classical and contemporary sacred and secular works from composers including Ivo Antognini, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, René Clausen, Keith Hampton, Don Macdonald, Edwin Fissinger, Johann Sebastian Bach, James MacMillan, Anders Edenroth, Frank Ticheli, and Larry L. Fleming.
“The Chamber Singers will perform a ‘Real Group’ arrangement of Swedish and Finnish folk songs that nod to our school’s unique heritage,” Davids added.
In the spirit of North Park’s vision to be a “campus without borders,” the tour complements student musicians’ formal training with experiential learning and real-world performances.
“I get to experience what it means to be a committed choral member and musician,” says senior vocal performance major Emily Swearer. “Choir tours mean singing under pressure, when you may not be feeling your best, when you have a million other things you need to do, and singing beautifully and intentionally anyway. It means being in close quarters with the same people for several days and choosing to work together, despite frustrations or fatigue, to make beautiful music.”
The tour also provides an opportunity to see the world beyond Chicago and build relationships with choirmates and faculty. Students room with local families during the tour and enjoy bonding during the bus rides between destinations.
“With my family and church family so far away, they never get to see me perform with the North Park choirs—I can’t wait to look out into the crowd and see their faces,” Swearer says. “This is my last year at North Park, and it’s also possibly my last choir tour ever. To have the end of such an influential chapter of my life close at home, is like coming full circle. I’m thankful.”
School of Music touring ensembles regularly visit parts of the country where there are concentrations of University alumni and ECC congregations.
“I always enjoy seeing students grow and meet the challenges we’ve given them,” said Davids. “It’s also a pleasure to serve as an ambassador for the University.”
All performances are free and open to the public:
Saturday, March 12, 6:30 pm, at Evergreen Covenant Church, Mercer Island, Wash.
Sunday, March 13, 11:00 am, at First Covenant Church, Seattle, Wash.
Sunday, March 13, 7:00 pm, at Bethany Covenant Church, Mount Vernon, Wash.
Monday, March 14, 7:00 pm, at Milwaukie Covenant Church, Portland, Ore.
Tuesday, March 15, 7:00 pm, at Highland Covenant Church, Bellevue, Wash.
Four of seven student applicants granted awards in 2014–2015
Kate Asnicar C’2015 (left) is serving as an English Teaching Assistant with the Fulbright Program in Malaysia. She began her assignment at a secondary school on the island of Borneo in January, with a primary focus on encouraging her students to use the English language.
In a recent email to Dr. Linda Parkyn, she said, “I am having an excellent time here, surviving the 90-degree heat, and am having a hard time coming up with reasons to ever leave. Thank you again for all your support and allowing me to have the best experience of my life!”
CHICAGO (March 2, 2016) — North Park University has once again been named a top-producer of students winning Fulbright awards, keeping company with schools that include the University of Chicago, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Villanova, and more. The Chronicle of Higher Educationpublished this list in conjunction with a February 22 article exploring Fulbrights’ efforts to diversify the students and scholars who participate in this international exchange program.
This honor as a top-producer is based on the 2014–2015 academic year, when seven North Park students applied for the program, and four were granted awards: Kate Asnicar, Andrea Mitchell, Christina Phillip, and Natalie Wilson. Since 2008, graduating North Park students have consistently won awards taking them around the globe, including to Indonesia, Brazil, Mexico, Andorra, Poland, Romania, Latvia, Bulgaria, Malaysia, Ecuador, Turkey, and Colombia.
Dr. Linda Parkyn, professor of Spanish, spearheads North Park’s efforts around Fulbright awards, serving as mentor and encourager to student applicants. She has been a Fulbright Scholar and twice a Fulbright Senior Specialist, and readily admits to having “Fulbrightis.” Good candidates, Parkyn says, have stellar grades, a keen interest in some other part of the world, involvement with immigrants and/or refugees at home, and knowledge of another language. “Fulbright is a prestigious award,” says Parkyn. “But to have this experience early in your life, to give back your first year out of college and become an American ambassador sharing language and culture, it will affect your career choices for the rest of your life—and affect change for good in our world!”
Parkyn has been working this academic year with student applicants, but official decisions on who will win student awards will be revealed by the Fulbright Program later this spring. “I can’t give anything away about our student applicants, but we do anticipate more North Parkers to travel the world with Fulbright this year,” she said. “We have three Fulbright semi-finalists for the 2015–2016 year.”
The February list of top-producing institutions is categorized by institution type, and North Park falls into the “master’s institution” category, a reflection of standard Carnegie Classifications for higher education institutions. This is the second time North Park has earned this distinction.
The Fulbright Program, the U.S. government’s flagship international educational exchange program, is sponsored by the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs of the United States Department of State. Since its inception in 1946, the Fulbright Program has provided more than 300,000 participants—chosen for their academic merit and leadership potential—with the opportunity to study, teach and conduct research, exchange ideas and contribute to finding solutions to shared international concerns.
Clergy, congregations, and students invited to March 5 event
Metropolitan Kallistos Ware’s lecture, “The Unchanging Gospel in an Ever-Changing World,” will offer practical wisdom and suggestions for congregations in the task of keeping the Gospel clear and central to faith for all generations.
CHICAGO (February 23, 2016) — Metropolitan Kallistos Ware will present the inaugural lecture at North Park University’s Engaging Orthodoxy Speakers’ Series, a free, single-day conference, Saturday, March 5, 2016, from 10:00 am until 3:30 pm. The author, professor, and bishop, perhaps best known for his book The Orthodox Church, will present a two-part lecture, followed by responses from other theologians.
According to Dr. Bradley Nassif, professor of biblical and theological studies at North Park and organizer of the Speakers’ Series, “Orthodoxy is on the cusp of a major theological renaissance in the 21st century. This annual event will help establish Orthodox theology as a vital religious force in American life and thought. Kallistos Ware is the right person for that. Coming from Oxford University, he is one of those rare individuals who come along every hundred years in the history of Christianity who is both brilliant and humble. He is a person of the academy, but also of the church. He’s a living legend in our time.”
Orthodoxy on an Evangelical Campus
As host of this event focused on Orthodox faith traditions, North Park University is highlighting the unifying elements of world Christianity. Nassif, a pioneer in North American ecumenical dialogue, has devoted much of his career to bridge-building between Orthodoxy and evangelicalism, building on both traditions’ roots in historic Christian theology and confession. Though Eastern Orthodoxy in the United States is a minority religion, it is one of the oldest faith traditions in Christianity, growing out of “the cradle of Christianity” in the Middle East, according to Nassif.
“I’ve worked to bring these two traditions together because I believe in both of them,” he said. Nassif teaches courses in Eastern Orthodoxy as well as others that explore faith connections across traditions. Bringing Kallistos Ware to campus is one way to introduce students from all faith traditions to the Orthodox vision of life.
Centered in the Gospel
Nassif organized the Speakers’ Series, with funding from the John C. Kulis Foundation, in the hope of providing practical resources for congregations and ministers across Christianity in the work of spreading the gospel. “We’re addressing a topic of central importance to Christian identity,” he said. “What is the gospel, and what difference does it make in the life of the church?”
North Park student Jeanette Habash shares her journey as an Orthoox Christian.
Ware’s lecture, “The Unchanging Gospel in an Ever-Changing Culture,” will reach to the heart of the question for our cultural atmosphere. “We’re living in a time when Christianity is constantly being redefined in order to fit the agenda of contemporary culture rather than the gospel of Jesus Christ,” Nassif said. “My greatest hope is that Bishop Kallistos will help people understand that the solution to the world’s problems is found most comprehensively in the witness of historic Christian faith. As a result, I hope pastors and people alike will learn how to keep the gospel clear and central for each generation—the very thing that is most urgently needed in Christianity today.”
The event has received an official endorsement by Demetrios, the Greek Orthodox Archbishop of America. “North Park’s efforts combined with the generosity of the Kulis Foundation will provide a new forum for engagement with the essential role and power of the Gospel in our Orthodox faith,” Demetrios said.
Respondents to Ware’s lecture include Father John Behr, dean at St. Vladimir’s Orthodox Seminary; Dr. Hauna Ondrey, teaching fellow in church history at North Park Theological Seminary; and Dr. Marcus Plested, associate professor of theology at Marquette University.
For more information and to register, visit www.northpark.edu/orthodox. For those unable to attend in person, Ware’s lectures will be available online through live-stream video at www.northpark.edu/live.
In year of diversity milestones, University launches cross-cultural campus discussions
President David Parkyn and Dean of Diversity and Intercultural Programs Terry Lindsay led a campus conversation on inclusion and diversity.
CHICAGO (February 12, 2016) — When North Park University was founded by Swedish immigrants 125 years ago, its student body was entirely Swedish, with all curriculum taught in Swedish. Today, as the University achieves significant diversity milestones and is recognized nationally for doing so, its institutional makeup is considerably different.
This school year, for the first time in North Park’s history, there is no racial or ethnic majority in its undergraduate population. No group of students, including Caucasians, reaches above fifty percent, highlighting the University’s commitment to creating a diverse campus community. Last week, the Chronicle of Higher Education called attention to the fact that North Park is “one of the few evangelical colleges where the number of minority students now equals white students.”
“David L. Parkyn, the college’s president,” said the Chronicle, “attributes that success to several things, including a historic commitment to diversity, which he talks about frequently, and being located in a diverse city like Chicago.”
Indeed, as Parkyn told a group of students, faculty, and staff in a campus conversation event earlier this week, “Today, we’re trying to make a shift from an objective of becoming multicultural—being comprised of people who come from diverse backgrounds, which is about composition as an institution—to being intercultural. How does the crossing of cultures get ingrained into the DNA of an institution?”
The conversation focused on diversity, inclusion, and the role that individual members of the North Park community play in continuing to shape the campus community. “We are a multicultural campus in terms of composition,” said Dr. Terry Lindsay, North Park’s dean of diversity and intercultural programs and associate professor of cultural studies, at the event. “But how do we move to being intercultural? How do we prepare our students for the world that we’re graduating them into?”
‘Moving Beyond Individualism Towards Community’
Parkyn and Lindsay opened the conversation by explaining that it would be the first in a series of campus-wide discussions in which issues surrounding diversity could be raised and engaged. As they opened the floor to questions, several members of the faculty and staff, as well as some students, asked about particular areas of cross-cultural initiatives on North Park’s campus, including the need to focus on “intracultural” work.
“For me, if intracultural isn’t happening while we’re doing intercultural work, we’re missing the boat,” said Lindsay. “I hope as we’re doing intercultural competency and development, we’re also helping students to think about who they are, their own identity. How those identities were formed. Who influenced the way they view the world, and the way they interact with cultures. And that’s the goal of this new project. We want to have some of those conversations.”
Throughout the semester, Lindsay and Provost Michael O. Emerson will hold a series of conversations, “Tessera to Ubuntu: Moving Beyond Individualism Towards Community,” featuring faculty and staff. “North Park grows increasingly diverse, which offers our community many advantages,” said Emerson. “But diversity in and of itself is not the goal. We seek to be a community within our diversity, to model how people from many different backgrounds can work together to encourage our faith, our studies, and our impact on the larger world. Our Tessera to Ubuntu Series is about how we can do exactly this, together.”
The first conversation, “Reclaiming Your Cultural History,” will focus on the metaphor of the tessera, an individual tile used to form a mosaic; the second, “Understanding Self,” will explore how cultures form; and the third, “Living in Community,” will highlight cultural immersion.
“We want North Park to be a diverse and inclusive environment, one which leads to deep learning and equity of experience for all students,” said Parkyn. “If we achieve this, our graduates will be positioned to cross cultures in the workplace and engage their communities in a socially responsible and transformational manner.”
CHICAGO (February 8, 2016) — Since its founding in 1891, North Park University has been thought of as “a work just beginning.” The phrase, made popular by the University’s first historian, Leland Carlson, in 1949, described a hopeful community, ready to live into its mission of preparing students for lives of significance and service.
As North Park begins its 125th year, that same hopeful spirit is alive and well across campus, propelling the University community to seek new ways to lead and serve in Chicago and around the world for God’s glory and neighbor’s good.
Throughout 2016, students, faculty, staff, alumni, and the wider Chicago community will have opportunities to explore North Park’s rich past, reflect on its present, and peer into its promising future. Celebrations will culminate on September 23, 2016, when the community gathers for an expansive quasquicentennial homecoming event, featuring art, music, scholarship, and other highlights from North Parkers past and present.
“2016 will be a great opportunity to remember where we have been,” said North Park University President David L. Parkyn. “But equally important will be the ways in which we imagine who we can become. North Park University’s mission has remained constant throughout its history, and with that as its foundation, we can build a promising future for our students and the communities they serve.”
Class of 1972 graduate and widely renowned composer Marvin V. Curtis has been commissioned to craft a piece that will be performed by student musicians at the event in September. Curtis, dean of the Ernestine M. Raclin School of the Arts at Indiana University South Bend, has a history of being commissioned to write prominent works, including one for President Clinton’s 1993 Inauguration, “City on a Hill.” He is the first African American composer commissioned to write a choral work for a presidential inauguration.
“The School of Music is honored that alumnus Marvin Curtis has accepted our invitation to compose a musical piece for North Park’s 125th anniversary celebration,” said Dr. Craig Johnson, dean of the School of Music. “The piece will be written for choir and a chamber instrumental ensemble, using a text that will be meaningful for the occasion. We very much anticipate the performance of his music, and we are confident that it will be a highlight of a very memorable celebration.”
The University’s F.M. Johnson Archives and Special Collections, led by Director of Archives Anna-Kajsa Anderson, will host a series of digital and in-person exhibits throughout the year. This includes an online version of the first 40 years of The Cupola, North Park’s yearbook, which contains essays, poems, songs, artwork, photographs, and more. Working with historians and former North Park professors Phil Anderson and Kurt Peterson, as well as current North Park Theological Seminary Professor Hauna Ondrey, the archives will also create a series of exhibits to display artifacts from the University’s history.
North Park’s present and future will also be on display in 2016 through the telling of 125 stories from 125 current students. The project, which will take place over the course of 12 months and two or three stories per week, will highlight the wide array of students who have been drawn to the University, and how they will help shape its next 125 years.
More announcements will be made throughout the year regarding new events and projects surrounding the University’s quasquicentennial. Visit www.northpark.edu/125 for more information and to hear how you can be part of the celebration.
Amanda Detchman completes exchange program, internship in Stockholm
Amanda Detchman, shown here in Uppsala, Sweden, is completing an internship at Immanuel International Church.
CHICAGO (February 5, 2016) — Amanda Detchman had a decision to make. Having just wrapped up her exchange program semester in Stockholm, Sweden, Detchman was preparing to return to the United States when she received an email asking if she was interested in staying in Sweden to fulfill an internship requirement.
Detchman, a master of divinity student at North Park Theological Seminary, was torn. “I was already in Sweden, immersed in the culture and eager to learn more,” she says. “However, signing the contract meant being away from home for another year. There was a lot of prayer and discernment involved.”
Detchman’s advisor, Professor of Ministry and Director of Field Education Dr. Tim Johnson, had gotten word that Immanuel International Church in Stockholm was seeking an interim youth pastor. “I forwarded that email to Amanda with a little note asking if she’d be interested,” he says. “The next thing I know, the match had been solidified. She had interviewed with them and impressed them, and it happened fairly quickly.”
“It was evidently God’s work,” Detchman says, “because I happened to be attending Immanuel for the four months prior, and already felt at home there. With the Spirit’s peace and God’s courage, I agreed to work as their youth director.”
Today, Detchman serves in an internship as youth director for Immanuel’s International Congregation. “Immanuel is very unique, because it’s made up of three congregations,” says Detchman, “Swedish, International, and Korean. The church staff work in the same building and have meetings and events together, but on Sunday, we hold three separate services at the same time.” In her position, Detchman helps oversee a summer camp, a conference for international youth across Europe, overnight “lock-ins,” and partnerships with homeless and elderly ministries.
As has been the case throughout her time in Sweden, this ministry context gives Detchman a uniquely global learning experience. “The joy I receive working with youth from around the world is challenging, eye-opening, and live-giving,” she says.
‘A growing experience’
It’s the kind of experience that Johnson hopes Seminary students will have through their field education opportunities, whether international or domestic. “We try to have every student have some experience in a cultural context that’s different from what they’re used to,” he says. “That’s a key part of the experience at North Park.”
Johnson had recommended the internship to Detchman, in part, because of her “evident interest in pastoral care,” he says. “On campus, she would often offer to pray for students or faculty members. I had an aunt that died, and I mentioned it in a chapel service. She later asked if she could pray about that with me. It’s bold as a student to come up to a faculty member and ask to pray for them, but that’s kind of how she’s constituted.”
Detchman in Stockholm with other THS exchange program students
Prior to her internship, Detchman came to Sweden through the Seminary’s exchange program partnership with the Stockholm School of Theology (THS). She applied for the program because “the courses sounded insightful, and I have a heart for understanding cultures other than my own,” she says. Once there, she found that “THS was a growing experience. I learned so much about myself, my writing, and the world.”
Among Detchman’s highlights of her time at THS were an Urban Theology course, which required hands-on work with a range of churches throughout Stockholm, and a Christians of the Middle East course, which included a trip to Jerusalem. “We had amazing guides and professors,” she says. “We met with a variety of religious leaders, toured the Holy Land, and engaged in field studies of surrounding communities.” In addition to Swedish students, Detchman enjoyed getting the opportunity to study alongside classmates from Burma and India.
Director of Seminary Recruitment and Admission Amy Oxendale believes that the exchange program is born out of North Park’s “passion for the global church and justice issues,” she says. “Many of the classes focus in this area and provide opportunity for our students to have an enriched learning experience—learning about issues of justice from a different part of the world and different cultural perspective.”
Oxendale hopes that “students would be able to return here with a different perspective, not just on theology and Scripture, but on who they are and who God is.” For her part, Detchman seems well on her way to doing exactly that. “The people I do ministry and work with here accept me and love me so well,” Detchman says. “They have taught me what it means to love deeply and engage fully in life’s adventures.”
The student team behind the free event invites peers and neighbors to campus February 5–6 for conversation and action
CHICAGO (February 2, 2016) — What can be done to bridge the gap between an understanding of social justice learned in the classroom and the application needed on the streets of Chicago? How can the academy, the community, and the church come together to engage issues of justice?
These are the questions that drove the 10 North Park University students who make up the Urban Outreach Programming Team to put together a new conference. They’re calling the event Love Mercy Do Justice, a name taken from Scripture: “And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God” (Micah 6:8). After several months of planning, the students are inviting community members as well as their peers to join them for the conference on Friday and Saturday, February 5–6.
“For both the academy and the church, it is often easy to separate theology/theory and application/praxis,” the team says. “It is our hope to bridge the divide between the intellect and the heart, by creating a space where millennials and the broader church can interact with contemplative activists, who see the primacy of mercy and justice as a tangible expression of their spirituality.”
The conference, which will be hosted on North Park’s campus, is free and open the public. “We’re able to engage everyone, whether it’s university students, the church, the community,” said Stefanie Cortez, a sophomore member of the Programming Team. “Being in a city as diverse as Chicago, we’re hoping to engage a wide spectrum of people from all walks of life in a conversation. With that conversation, we can take an action.”
The schedule of the event reflects this turn from conversation to action. Friday’s programming focuses on learning: a prayer breakfast, lectures, panels, and a celebration of the arts. Speakers include Rev. Marshall Hatch, Father Michael Pfleger, Rev. Sandra Van Opstal, Reesheda Washington, Rev. Dominique Gilliard, North Park’s provost and president, and staff of the Evangelical Covenant Church.
Saturday’s schedule will engage attendees in practicing justice. The morning starts with a prayer walk through the Albany Park neighborhood lead by clergy, and the event closes with a call to action, facilitated by local organization Communities United and North Park’s Faith and Justice group. The closing session will focus on justice reinvestment, a data-driven approach to improving public safety, reducing corrections and related criminal justice spending, and reinvesting savings in strategies that can decrease crime and reduce recidivism.
“As students, we quickly get lost in the justice conversation,” said Abigail Page, a junior and member of Programming Team. “We’re busy with classes. We’re maybe 20 years old. We don’t necessarily feel like we can do a whole lot. But we have a very important role as future leaders. This conference is a great opportunity to practice that.”
Students and community members are welcome to attend single sessions throughout the day. Attendees can register for free online or at the door. The Love Mercy Do Justice Conference is a collaboration between the Evangelical Covenant Church Love Mercy Do Justice mission priority and North Park’s University Ministries.
Rev. Jim Sundholm C’67 S’72 receives Seminary Alumni Award for Distinguished Service
“I could talk at great length about the role the Seminary professors played in my life,” Rev. Jim Sundholm said on Tuesday night while accepting the North Park Theological Seminary Award for Distinguished Service. Learn more about the award its previous recipients.
CHICAGO (January 29, 2016) — On Tuesday night in front of a thousand ministers of the Evangelical Covenant Church (ECC), Rev. Jim Sundholm, a graduate of North Park University in 1967 and North Park Theological Seminary in 1972, was described as both a pastor and a prophet.
Sundholm has served as a pastor to many communities, and also provided a prophetic voice in the commitment to urban and intercultural ministries that have had a profound effect in the shaping of North Park and the ECC.
“Throughout his vocational arc, Jim led us more deeply into the commitment of justice,” Kersten said, recalling when Sundholm moved to Minneapolis in the 1970s to pastor a church focused on urban and intercultural issues and was a pioneer in the Sankofa movement. “Jim is someone who has had a powerful life of public ministry, as well as a deep personal prayer life that has sustained him.”
Sundholm is also the former director of Covenant World Relief (CWR) and executive director of the Paul Carlson Partnership from 1999 to 2009. Known for his dedicated leadership and deep concern for the poor, Sundholm led CWR in responding to the devastation created by Hurricane Katrina in 2005.
“I could talk at great length about the role the Seminary professors played in my life,” Sundholm said on Tuesday while accepting the award. He recalled a conversation with a former professor, Dr. Henry Gustafson, on the Gospel of John. Partway through the conversation, Gustafson reached across the table and asked Sundholm, ‘When will you give God your mind as much as your heart?’ As Sundholm shared on Tuesday, “That was my second conversion.”
Vice President for for Development and Alumni Relations Mary K. Surridge, Rev. Jim Sundholm, North Park University President David L. Parkyn, North Park Theological Seminary Dean Rev. Dr. David W. Kersten
Sundholm has traveled extensively to Africa, developing relationships with the emerging Covenant Church in South Sudan and Ethiopia. Today, he lives in Vashon, Wash., with his wife, Carol.
“On behalf of over 25,000 alumni at North Park, we offer our deep admiration to Jim for his work in the Covenant Church and to the relief and renewal efforts across the world,” said Surridge. “We are thankful to you and Carol for your devotion to God, and for the model it presents to all of us as we seek to do God’s work.”
The Seminary Alumni Award for Distinguished Service, established in 2014 and delivered annually at the ECC’s Midwinter Conference, recognizes Seminary alumni who have made significant contributions in their fields while living lives reflective of the core values and mission of North Park Theological Seminary. Learn more about the award and previous recipients.
Office of Diversity presents dramatic storytelling event on Martin Luther King Jr. Day
Alumna Leslie Moore, backed by the University Gospel Choir, performs the song “Strange Fruit.”
CHICAGO (January 20, 2016) — As Rev. Dr. Michael C.R. Nabors takes the stage, he begins reciting famous words. “I’ve seen the promised land,” he says in a familiar cadence, while a jazz band performing John Coltrane’s “Alabama” starts to fade. “I may not get there with you,” Nabors continues, “but I want you to know tonight that we as a people will get to the promised land.” The music ends. A shot rings out.
It was one of the more dramatic and powerful moments of North Park University’s Martin Luther King Day service, “A Man and a Movement Set to Music: 1960–2016.” The University’s annual commemoration of the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., held Monday in Anderson Chapel and presented by the Office of Diversity and Intercultural Programs, took on a different form this year.
“We had been doing the format of a worship and service day for many years, and wanted to try a different model,” says Rev. Velda Love, director of justice and intercultural learning. “We thought about how to include as many people as possible. And we wanted to keep a focus on the integrity of Dr. King’s life as well as include more of a journey through the African American experience,” she says. “We sought to make sure that it was historically correct, and then bring it into more of a contemporary element.”
Love decided on a dramatic storytelling presentation that marked Dr. King’s place in African American history, looking back to the genesis of the African people and culminating in a focus on a movement that continues today. “A Man and a Movement” explored Dr. King’s roles as leader, prophetic preacher, and intellectual giant through poetry, oratory, dance, and gospel and contemporary music.
The service was broken into five acts: “In a Beginning”; “A Movement for Civil Rights”; “Good and Faithful Servants”; “A Change is Gonna Come”; and “From Lament to Hope.”
Members and guests of the North Park community, including students, faculty, and staff, performed at the event.
Members of the North Park community, including faculty, staff, and Seminary students, performed readings from important figures throughout African American history, including Harriet Tubman, Diane Nash, and John Lewis, among others, in addition to Dr. King. Friends of the North Park community, including Rev. Cecilia Williams, executive minister of the Evangelical Covenant Church’s Love Mercy Do Justice department, also performed.
Nabors, senior pastor of Second Baptist Church, Evanston, Ill., was joined by the Rejoice! Praise Dancers and Voices of Faith and Freedom, also from Second Baptist. Music was performed by the AV Club jazz quartet, featured alumni, and North Park’s Gospel Choir, guest-directed by Bryan Johnson, minister of music director at Trinity United Church of Christ, Chicago.
Musical highlights included performances by alumni Leslie Moore, singing Nina Simone’s version of “Strange Fruit,” and Felicia Patton, singing Thomas Dorsey’s “Precious Lord.” The service closed with a moving rendition of “Glory” from the film Selma, sung and rapped by alumna Sharon Irving (a contestant on America’s Got Talent last season), with backing from the Gospel Choir and the jazz quartet, and featuring the Rejoice! Praise Dancers. The performance earned a standing ovation from the audience.
Director of Justice and Intercultural Learning Rev. Velda Love wrote and directed the program.
“It was such a wonderful opportunity to see the gifts and talents of the community,” says Love, “and to make sure that there was this collaboration between the academy and the church.”
One way that the program called out that collaboration was through offering a blessing over North Park’s future leaders, including the Seminary students who participated in the event. “The elders are passing the torch,” said Love at the event. “They’re not stepping aside, they’re standing with. They’re journeying together. They’re listening, they are praying, and they are singing together. They’re making space to be a movement together.”
The audience, led by the faculty and staff who performed in the service, read a commitment and call to action liturgy for young people. “They don’t go alone,” said Love before the reading. “This millennial generation, they go with the blessings of the elders. And they go with the blessings of God. But they also need our blessings.”
In her closing remarks, Love challenged the gathered group to continue Dr. King’s legacy through action. “This is the world that we come to,” she said. “This is the place that God has called us. This is what King desired, the ‘Beloved Community.’ And we acknowledge that God is with us as we remember Dr. King. We want to thank you for coming to be with us, to hear the story, to celebrate the music, and to participate in the journey.”
The Krawiec sisters not only studied and lived together—they now work together at Skokie Hospital
Brittany, Sarah, and Rachel Krawiec
CHICAGO (January 5, 2016) — At North Park University’s recent Winter Commencement, one poster in the university’s crowded gymnasium stood out. Sitting in the risers, Antoni Krawiec held up a hand painted sign reading, “All my sisters are RNs.”
Among the graduates marching in were three of Antoni’s four sisters—a set of triplets, Brittany, Rachel, and Sarah—each of whom received a bachelor of science in nursing.
The sisters completed the entire program together, following in the footsteps of their older sister, Jennifer Krawiec, who graduated from North Park’s nursing program in May 2014. “Our parents strongly encouraged us to pursue a degree where we had the promise to a lifelong career,” the sisters said in an email. “We were unsure if nursing was the right fit for all of us until we entered the nursing program. We each found an area that we wholeheartedly enjoyed and know throughout the years our passion will continue to grow.”
The four sisters’ studies at North Park overlapped, but they don’t seem to mind all the togetherness. “We’re a really close family in general,” said Sarah. “It’s been great to spend this time together.”
Antoni Krawiec cheering on his sisters at graduation.
Helene K. Pochopien, assistant professor of nursing, had the triplets together in a class and called them “top performers” and “a joy to have as students.” She described how the three rose to the challenge in a difficult class, where they “scored almost identically, but missed different test questions.”
Academics weren’t the only challenge for the Krawiec family, who live in suburban Niles, Ill., and had five kids in college at once. “There was one car for the four girls attending North Park,” said their mother, Tracy Krawiec. “When they had to go to different locations, it was stressful.”
But at the triplets’ graduation, Tracy said she was overjoyed. For one thing, she’ll no longer have multiple kids in college. But she’s also thrilled for what’s ahead for the triplets, who are all working at Skokie Hospital as patient care technicians. “They’re guaranteed nursing jobs as soon as they take their NCLEX exam,” Tracy said.
After graduating from North Park, Jennifer got her first job at Skokie Hospital, and the younger sisters decided they wanted to follow suit. They enjoy the uniquely community-oriented, family-friendly environment of the hospital. Through their clinicals, the triplets got to know the staff, and eventually they all landed jobs in different units. Brittany works on the medical surgical floor, Rachel on stroke/tele, Sarah in the emergency department. After passing one more certification, the younger three plan to pursue nursing roles at the hospital, like their sister, Jennifer, who works as an RN in the orthopedic unit.
Equipped with BSNs, the sisters are ready to begin their careers serving at Skokie Hospital.
The sisters like working at a small hospital, where they sometimes float to each other’s units or work the same shifts. They currently live at home in Niles, but they’re planning to move together somewhere closer to the hospital. Despite all the similarities in their lives, they do differ when it comes to nursing specialties. “We don’t intend on working in the same units,” said Rachel, “because we don’t like the same things in the field of nursing.”
North Park’s School of Nursing and Health Sciences, which teaches a caring philosophy grounded in faith, is among the University’s most popular departments. At this graduation ceremony, nearly a third of the undergraduate degrees conferred were in nursing. The Krawiec sisters say the people at North Park were the highlight—staff and students who shaped their outlooks and one-to-one interaction with professors in small classes. “We’re excited to graduate,” said Sarah. “This is an amazing program, and we think we’re going to become amazing nurses because of it.”
Author tomgabrysiakPosted on Categories Stories
The 
