Scholarship
All ATFE members are educators, curating contextual learning experiences and networking with institutional partners. We are also teachers, preachers, and regular contributors to the field through research, writing, and scholarship.
Reflective Practice supports and is supported by ATFE.
Volume 42 of Reflective Practice is now available with over a dozen ATFE colleagues contributing! Click here to read the issue, available free online: Reflective Practice, Vol 42.
Printed copies are available for purchase through the journal’s web site: www.reflective-practice-journal.org.
Dear ATFE Colleagues,
Formation and Supervision as Creative Imagination
Volume 43, 2023
How long, O Lord? How long?
This last year, just as we began to be hopeful, the omicron variant entered our collective experience.
We’ve learned to be more resilient, but how long?
We’ve supported students in their learning as graduate programs, faith communities, medical centers, and community service organizations have struggled with safety and protocols, but how long?
We’ve creatively reconstructed classroom experiences and learned new technical skills, but how long?
We’ve grieved the loss of collegial in-person conferences and trainings, but how long?
We believe the extreme constraints under which we are working are providing us with an opportunity to tap into our deep wells of creative expression and that we are doing just that right now. Reflective Practice wants to foster, celebrate, and share the emerging creativity in our field by inviting you, our readers, to write about the imaginative ways you are offering formation and supervision to those you serve. Volume 43 provides the blue-sky space, the blank canvas, the dreamer’s playground to imagine how the work that we do could tap into new pathways and practices, enliven tradition, or envision whole new vistas for formation and supervision.
We extend this invitation to all our creative colleagues—to imagine formation and supervision afresh. Essays, poems, visual art, and case studies outside of the theme are also welcome.
We look forward to the spark that volume 43 will provide to inform our work and encourage each other. For more information or to express interest in contributing to volume 43, please contact co-editors Nancy Wood, nancyelizabethwood@gmail.com, or Matthew Floding, mfloding@div.duke.edu. The deadline for submissions to volume 43 is October 1, 2022.
Grace and peace,
Matt Floding
Research and Publications Committee
The Research and Publications Committee supports ATFE members who conduct research, publish articles, and produce books. The committee fosters and encourages qualitative and quantitative research. One particular interest is supporting research that benefits the proliferation of ATFE’s work through collaborative efforts of field educators.
Current Chair
Sung Hee Chang
Associate Professor of Supervised Ministry
Director of Supervised Ministry and Vocational Planning
Union Presbyterian Seminary, Charlotte Campus
research@atfe.org
t: 980-636-1681
ATFE Research Grants
The committee invites applications for ATFE Research Grants. This is an opportunity for ATFE members to research and present on an area of interest that intersects with the work of Field Educators. The committee is primarily concerned with encouraging field educators to build their research skills and explore questions that impact their work with students, institutions and the wider community. Collaborative proposals are encouraged. We also see this as an opportunity for members to build exposure to the grant writing process.
Criteria for ATFE Grant Awards
- The applicant must be a member of ATFE in good standing. This criterion can be waived, if the proposed research directly focuses on furthering the goals of ATFE.
- The proposal must be complete and submitted by March 1.
- The Research & Publications Committee will evaluate the proposal on the quality of the application, its relevance for theological field education, and its alignment with the current goals and objectives of the association.
- The applicant must include a plan for dissemination of the results. This can be done by sharing with the ATFE membership the results of his/her research through a presentation at the Biennial consultation or a scholarly publication such as Reflective Practice: Formation and Supervision in Ministry. The applicant must stipulate in the proposal how they plan to share their results and at which Consultation they would be willing to make their presentation.
- Preference will be given to research that will be carried out as part of a sabbatical.
- Applicants who are part of the Research & Publications Committee are eligible, but must absent themselves from the deliberation process.
- Preference is given to first time applicants. Prior funding does not, however, preclude award.
- The ATFE Research Committee may not award any funding if the proposal(s) submitted do not merit award or do not implement the aims of ATFE. Generally, study leaves or course preparation will not be funded.
Applying for an ATFE Research Grant:
- The proposal needs to be submitted to the Chair of the ATFE Research Committee. The committee chair will circulate it among the committee members for review and final recommendation.
- Applications are due no later than March 1 of each year.
- The proposal needs to be brief with the narrative portion not more than 5 pages single-spaced.
- Please note that the bi-annual funds available for all ATFE research grant proposals is $4,000. We recommend grant requests of $1000 so that we are able to support multiple requests.
A Complete Proposal Includes:
- Abstract of your Proposal
- Outline of the nature of the research to be conducted (this needs to be a clear statement of your research focus)
- Narrative that includes: the research, its relevance for theological field education and how the applicant plans to share the results with ATFE. Include purpose and procedures relevant to research type (e.g., anticipated outcomes, theoretical framework, methods for sampling, data collection and analysis, and instruments proposed) as well as, your anticipated outcomes, plan for evaluation and a date for completion of the project.
- Budget
- Timeline that includes dates for research, evaluation, financial reporting and dissemination
- CV or Resume of applicant and if applicable, other research partners.
