Chuuk Distance Education

Last week I flew down to Chuuk to meet with the leadership of the Evangelical Church of Chuuk about the changes PIU is making there and at our other off-campus sites. For the coming school year we are converting our Teaching Facilities to Distance Education computer labs, mainly because we just don't have enough staff, faculty, administration and resources to maintain the excellent quality of the main campus and also keep the off-campus sites at the same academic level. I was hoping that the leadership of the ECC would be willing to work with us while we are in this one-year transition period. However, they voted last week to break all ties with PIBC and with Liebenzell Mission. For me it was a very difficult time and I was so sad that after a relationship of 33 years with PIBC and 103 years with the mission that it would end like this. On a positive note though, the door seems to have opened for us to make a partnership with another church group in Chuuk and we will open our Distance Education Teaching Facility at Mizpah High School next week. For more details you can read the text of the radio announcement that we made in Chuuk today on the PIBC web page. We are still praying that we can have good relationship will all the church groups in Chuuk and meet all the Christian higher education needs there.