The Institute for Christian Studies (ICS or ICS Toronto) is a private, graduate-level Reformed philosophical and theological school in Toronto, Ontario. At ICS, students and faculty take part in shared learning through participatory seminars, mentoring, and an interdisciplinary approach to study. There are several unrelated institutions bearing similar names.
Associations
ICS is affiliated with the Vrije Universiteit (VU or Free University). The Vrije Universiteit has co-sponsored and co-supervised some ICS doctoral degrees. The Institute is also an affiliated institution to the Toronto School of Theology at the University of Toronto. The Toronto School of Theology allows students to take a certain number of credits towards their degree from external institutions, including ICS. ICS students may also take some of their course work at the University of Toronto Department of Philosophy.
Other affiliations
The Institute for Christian Studies is part of a worldwide movement for Christian higher education, where a primary task is often the fostering of teachers for the elementary and secondary levels. In this regard, ICS offers K-12 teachers an Educational Leadership emphasis in its Master of Arts in Philosophy degree program, and prepares Master of Arts in Philosophy and PhD-level graduates to teach across disciplines in colleges and universities, or to enter into a more activist profession. With its unique emphasis among English-based Christian programs of advanced studies, ICS is also a dedicated affiliate of the International Network for Christian Higher Education (INCHE) formerly called the International Association for Promotion of Christian Higher Education (IAPCHE). INCHE is a worldwide network that advances Christian higher education through professional development, scholarship, capacity building, and communication. The network seeks to reflect both the shared view that Christ is central to those efforts and the local realities.
Faith & Learning Network, ICS's online worldwide service
As part of its services to its broad circle of affiliated institutions and interested individuals, ICS maintains the Faith & Learning Network (FLN) developed over several years. Principally, FLN is a bibliographic resource that can be accessed directly from the ICS website. Its purpose is to disseminate information on the results of Christian research publications, and popularizations, to various learning levels that resonate with the vision of ICS, INCHE, and related worldwide organizations and movements.
History
ICS is accredited by the Ontario government. The original model for ICS was the Central Interfaculty of the Free University (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam), an interdisciplinary philosophy department in which the foundations of the special disciplines were to be investigated. The founders of ICS were convinced that a Christian graduate school was vital to generating comprehensively informed perspectives by biblical revelation. Henk Hart was ICS's inaugural professor with the opening of the school in 1967. In 1972, ICS moved to its current location on College Street in Toronto, and had added several faculty and had begun granting master's-level certification in philosophy. In 1980, ICS began to develop a doctoral programme in co-operation with the Free University of Amsterdam.
In 1983, ICS (then, the Association for the Advancement of Christian Scholarship, or AACS) received Royal Assent to a Charter from the Legislative Assembly of Ontario allowing ICS to grant a Master of Philosophical Foundations, and to offer a program of doctoral studies leading to a PhD conferred by the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. The AACS then ceased to exist and allowed the ICS to develop. In 1992, ICS was authorized to grant a Master of Worldview Studies degree, a one-year program in large part to accommodate non-philosophers teaching in Christian elementary and secondary schools. In December 2004, ICS was given ministerial permission to grant PhD and MA in Philosophy degrees on its own standing before the Crown, without a necessary mediation through the Free University Amsterdam – a process which culminated in receiving Royal Assent to grant these degrees from the Legislative Assembly of Ontario in June 2005. The strong bond between ICS and the VU, and inter-academic affiliation and cooperation, continues.