Our Identity and Values
Our Identity
Union University is an academic community, affiliated with the Tennessee Baptist Convention, equipping persons to think Christianly and serve faithfully in ways consistent with its core values of being excellence-driven, Christ-centered, people-focused, and future-directed. These values shape its identity as an institution which prioritizes liberal arts based undergraduate education enhanced by professional and graduate programs. The academic community is composed of quality faculty, staff, and students working together in a caring, grace-filled environment conducive to the development of character, servant leadership, and cultural engagement.
Our Core Values
- Excellence-Driven: We believe that excellence, not mere compliance, is the goal of our teaching, our research, and our service. We are not motivated to excellence out of pride but out of a desire to do all things for God’s glory because He cares about our work and wants to be involved in everything we do. We will not be satisfied with mediocrity, but will pursue excellence in all things. This means our truth claims carry with them the challenge of living out that truth in the minutes and hours of our daily life. Thus we will pursue excellence, without arrogance.
- Christ-Centered: A cohering core value of our guiding vision is a call to faith, a call to be Christ centered in all that we are and in all that we do. We will seek to build a Christian liberal arts-based community where men and women can be introduced to an understanding and appreciation of God, His creation and grace, and to humanity’s place of privilege and responsibility in this world. We will seek to establish all aspects of life and learning on the Word of God, leading to a firm commitment to Christ and His Kingdom. To be a Christ-centered institution calls for us to establish the priority of worship and service in the Christian life while seeking to develop a generation of students who can be agents of reconciliation to a factious church in a hurting and broken world. This commitment calls for all faculty and staff to integrate Christian faith in all learning and doing, based on the supposition that all truth is God’s truth and that there is no contradiction between God’s truth made known to us in Holy Scripture and that which is revealed to us through creation and natural revelation.
- People-Focused: A third pillar on which we will build our common commitments is the core value of being people focused. At the heart of our commitment to being people focused is the visible demonstration of valuing one another. We will give honor to one another through our words and actions, and by committing to each person’s success. We therefore jointly commit ourselves to the success of Union University.
- Future-Directed: We will seek to maximize the windows of opportunity the Lord has presented to us to the greatest degree that resources allow. All of our resources and efforts must, by God’s grace, be maximized to fulfill our common mission. A commitment to being future directed means we want to have a short-term focus and a long-term view. We want to involve ourselves in efforts that prepare us effectively to impact the world of the 21st Century.
Our Mission
Union University provides Christ-centered education that promotes excellence and character development in service to Church and society.