MTSO will welcome alumni, students, faculty and staff – as well as former Methesco employees and guests of our Mount Award honorees – as we celebrate the first opportunity to gather in two years.

Alumni Day 2021 opens with a morning chapel service, with Bishop C. Joseph Sprague (M.Div. ’65) preaching. The day continues with a luncheon honoring these recipients of the John and Ruth Mount Alumni Awards for Distinguished Service:

• Paulette Buford-James (M.Div. ’13), superintendent, Starkville District, Mississippi Conference of the United Methodist Church.
• Grace Imathiu (M.Div. ’87), senior pastor, First United Methodist Church, Evanston, Illinois.
• David MacDonald (M.Div. ’02), university chaplain, Ohio Northern University.

As always, lunch will feature Seminary Hill Farm produce and other locally sourced food.

After lunch, guests are invited to take guided tours of the MTSO campus or Seminary Hill Farm.

All events are presented at no cost, though everyone who plans to attend is asked to RSVP here. This advance registration will help with food preparation and other planning.

Members of the classes of 2020 and 2021 have been invited to a special Alumni Day Eve gathering Sept. 12. If you’re a 2020 or 2021 grad and haven’t received information about the gathering, please email Susan Zimmerman at szimmerman@mtso.edu.

Tapping the expertise of the Dunn Dining Hall kitchen, MTSO is offering “Good and Healthy,” a video cooking resource for the All People’s Fresh Market, an initiative of Community Development for All People on Columbus’ south side. In a series of seven videos, MTSO Sous Chef Daejah McCormick offers recipes using fresh Seminary Hill Farm produce being provided to those who shop at the Fresh Market.

The pilot summer program is funded through a grant by the Harry C. Moores Foundation to MTSO’s Community Food and Wellness Initiative.

The videos are part of intensive learning workshops serving 15 families, with a focus on underlying health conditions such as hypertension and diabetes. This project fulfills a Community Food and Wellness Initiative objective: to facilitate expanded distribution of Seminary Hill Farm’s produce in low-income neighborhoods and support the educational programs with our community partners.

The first five videos are available here. Two more semi-weekly videos will be added to the web page in coming weeks.

Alums, don’t let significant moments in your life or vocation pass without sharing them in The Story Magazine and Annual Report. We’re compiling Alum News now and would like to hear from you.

It’s easy to bring everyone up to date. Just visit our news and info page and complete the form. You can visit the same page to update your address and other contact info so that you don’t miss any news or correspondence from MTSO.

At the request of the Agrarian Trust, Seminary Hill Farm has contributed to the “Faithlands Toolkit,” a new publication fostering partnerships between farmers, faith communities and food systems. The Agrarian Trust's mission is to support land access for next generation farmers.

The PDF book is available here. Seminary Hill Farm is featured on pages 126-128. The entry traces the history of MTSO’s farm and details its mission and sustainable methods, from organic-matter management to community engagement and social justice.

Congratulations to MTSO alumni and students who are celebrating ordination, commissioning and other ministry milestones this summer. Donald Ackerman (M.Div. ’19), pictured here, was among those ordained in the East Ohio Conference of the United Methodist Church. (Photo courtesy of East Ohio Conference Communications.)

See our full tally of those marking ministry milestones here.