City Vision Volunteer & Advisory Council Application

Who Are Ideal Advisory Council Members and Volunteers?

  1. Retirees from Rescue Missions, the Salvation Army, addiction counseling centers and other ministries serving the poor and addicted.
  2. Retirees from academia who have a passion for the poor and addicted.
  3. Christian leaders in academia or ministries who could lend their expertise to help us build high quality programs.

Expectations for Advisory Council Members

  1. Required. Provide extensive feedback in our survey of advisory board to help us improve our programs and courses once a year
  2. Required. Attend an advisory board conference call once a year to provide feedback
  3. Optional. Volunteer in any other way that might be helpful. Examples include: assisting in program and course design, assisting in partnership development, assisting with grant writing and fundraising, teaching online courses. We are also open to additional ideas. 

Volunteer & Advisory Council Application

About City Vision University

City Vision University is an online-only, Christian university with the goal of transforming lives through radically affordable online education. The school provides Bachelor’s Degrees in Business Administration, Addiction Studies, Nonprofit Management, and Missions, Christian Ministry & Leadership, an Associate’s Degree in Business Administration, and an MBA. It is a program of the Christian nonprofit TechMission, and was originally founded in 1998 by the Association of Gospel Rescue Missions. It has been growing at an average of 15% per year since 2008. We have 20+ adjunct faculty practitioners. The school’s values are in the evangelical social justice tradition although we serve students from all denominations as well as non-Christian students. 

TechMission/City Vision hiring practices and EEO Statement are fully in compliance with both federal and state law. Federal law creates an exception to the “religion” component of the employment discrimination laws for religious organizations (including educational institutions), and permits them to give employment preference to members of their own religion. City Vision is in this category.  

Our Mission is to use online education to transform lives through Jesus, Justice and Technology.

01

Jesus

City Vision was initially founded to provide online Christian education to staff at evangelical organizations serving the poor as well as their program participants. While this still remains a core focus, we have since expanded to also provide Christian education to students pursuing nonprofit and counseling careers. See our Statement of Faith.

02

Justice

We promote Justice through radically affordable, practical education focused on addressing the needs of the poor, addicted and underserved.

03

Technology

We use Technology in our cost-effective, disruptive innovation, lean startup approach to online education. We are pioneering a new model that could increase access to Christian higher education by tenfold or more, especially to the poor and the developing world. 

Recognition and Awards





Profile on City Vision President
Andrew Sears
City Vision University's President Andrew Sears' story was featured in Christianity Today.
Read the Story




City Vision/TechMission
Case Study
TechMission/City Vision was the subject of a nonprofit case study by three Northeastern Professors in the Journal of Case Research.
Read the Case Study




US Department of Education
Innovation Award Finalist
City Vision was a finalist in the US Department of Education's "Reimagining the Higher Education Ecosystem" competition along with
edX, Google & others.
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Innovation Award Special Recognition
City Vision received a Special Recognition Award for innovative programs in higher education alongside global leaders like MIT and Purdue.
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Thought Leadership in Disruptive Innovation
City Vision University's President Andrew Sears was invited to write two articles for the Christensen Institute for Disruptive Innovation's blog.
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Article on City Vision Partnership
City Vision was featured in an article in Forbes about our innovative partnership with Saylor Academy.
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Statistics with Nonprofits and Ministries

Nonprofit Partners in the Past
0
Full-time Interns Placed in Nonprofits
0
Nonprofits Sending Students to City Vision
0

History of City Vision

City Vision has roots and history that span rescue missions, Christian community development, the Salvation Army, evangelical ministries, Christian recovery and the Black church traditions. All of these traditions inform our values and core organizational DNA. We also have a rich history of innovation from our leadership’s involvement in co-founding a MIT research group with one of the fathers of the Internet, involvement in the 90’s dot-com boom and leading disruptive innovation in higher education today.

1998

agrmlogoCity Vision is founded as the
education arm of AGRM
called Rescue College.

1998

2002

ccdaTechMission is founded out of a Black church ministry PREP and the Christian Community Development Association movement and develops a partnership network of 500+ education programs in urban ministries.

2002

2005

deacRescue College is accredited by the Distance Education Accrediting Commission with a Bachelor’s degree completion program in Missions.

2005

2007

TechMission launches UrbanMinistry.org and ChristianVolunteering.org which grew to have 100,000+ open educational resources and became the third most visited website among Christian organizations serving the poor.

2007

2008

transparent tm org logoRescue College becomes a part of the Christian nonprofit TechMission and was renamed City Vision College.

2008

2015

CityVision SEAL transparent v2 lgCity Vision College starts
offering graduate
programs and becomes
City Vision University.​

2015

2016

City Vision’s leadership co-founds the Christian Higher Education Innovation Alliance with 100+ leaders with the vision of expanding Christian higher education to the poor and developing world.

2016

2019

City Vision launches free, non-credit Massive
Open Online Courses in Education Management
in partnership with the Christion Higher Education Innovation Alliance with over 7,000 users.

2019

Our Partners






Scholarship Partner
Any student from a rescue mission or Citygate member organization will receive a 15% scholarship.
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Scholarship & Credit Partner
Students completing Saylor Academy courses can receive credits for prior learning and a scholarship.
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Scholarship Partner
Any student affiliated with the Salvation Army will receive a 15% scholarship.
Find Out More





Scholarship & Credit Partner
Students from University of the Nations can receive up to 30 credits for prior learning and a scholarship.
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Scholarship & Credit Partner
Students from the Urban Ministry Institute an receive up to 30 credits for prior learning.
Find Out More





Scholarship & Credit Partner
Students from Wheeler's Biblical Counseling Program can receive up to 30 credits for prior learning and a scholarship.
Find Out More





Scholarship & Credit Partner
Students taking Thirdmill courses at MyThirdmill.org can receive up to 30 credits for prior learning and a scholarship.
Find Out More





Scholarship Partner
Students from St. Matthew's house receive a scholarship.
Find Out More

Find Out More

Goal 1: Christian Social Service Education: to provide affordable, practical education enabling Christian leaders to transform the lives of the poor, addicted and underserved with continuous innovation.

Goal 2: Radically Affordable and Free Education: to use disruptive innovation to provide free educational content and radically affordable programs to diffuse innovation and best practices for Christians serving the poor and increase our global presence. 

Goal 3: Human Capacity: to recruit and develop faculty and staff so they can provide effective education to our students, further our mission and pursue their own calling.

Goal 4:  System Capacity: to provide effective accounting, finance, technology and administrative support to City Vision University’s programs and services in a way that reflects our values and achieves our mission.

Goal 5: Financial Capacity: to secure significantly increased resources and expanded enrollment enabling City Vision to add new programs, expand existing programs and further our mission.

This statement of faith comes primarily from the statement of faith of National Association of Evangelicals, with a few minor elements of CCDA’s statement of faith added to reflect our justice values:
  • We believe the Bible to be the inspired, the only infallible, authoritative Word of God and through it we are called to live out justice, reconciliation and redemption. We believe that there is one God, eternally existent in three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
  • We believe in the deity of our Lord Jesus Christ in His virgin birth, in His sinless life, in His miracles, in His vicarious and atoning death through His shed blood, in His bodily resurrection, in His ascension to the right hand of the Father, and in His personal return in power and glory.
  • We believe that for the salvation of lost and sinful man, regeneration by the Holy Spirit is absolutely essential and that the church nurtures God’s people gathered as a community to carry out God’s Word.
  • We believe in the present ministry of the Holy Spirit by whose indwelling the Christian is enabled to live a godly life.
  • We believe in the resurrection of both the saved and the lost; they that are saved unto the resurrection of life and they that are lost unto the resurrection of damnation.
  • We believe in the spiritual unity of believers in our Lord Jesus Christ.

City Vision University is a “doing business as name” of the 501(c)(3) nonprofit ministry, TechMission. They are essentially the same organization with the same staff, board, finances, etc. TechMission previously had programs other than City Vision, but now it is essentially our only program. TechMission is incorporated in Massachusetts, whereas City Vision University is based out of Kansas City, Missouri.