SMMS President, Rev Prof Simangaliso Kumalo, has been appointed Fellow of Wesley House, the Methodist College in Cambridge, United Kingdom.

The prestigious Fellowship will be for an initial period of three years, beginning on 1st January 2018 and renewable.

As part of the Fellowship, Prof Kumalo will be travelling to Cambridge in March 2018 for six weeks to make contributions to the life of the college through academic research and publishing. He will also travel to the college each year for a week. During his time in Cambridge, he will be expected to give public lectures, contribute to the courses, supervise students’ research and preach during the college chapel services.

Wesley House has a long-standing association with SMMS (and John Wesley College before that).

Wesley House is an international postgraduate college firmly rooted in the Methodist tradition and located in the heart of Cambridge. It is a founder member of the Cambridge Theological Federation, an ecumenical partnership of nine educational institutes with over 300 students and 25 staff. The formal degree programmes on which Wesley House staff teach and supervise are awards of either the University of Cambridge or one of the other partner universities with which the Cambridge Theological Federation has a relationship, Anglia Ruskin University and the University of Durham.

Academic staff of the College work as associate lecturers within the Faculty of Divinity of the University of Cambridge, and as Anglia Ruskin University lecturers.

Prof Kumalo’s appointment is an affirmation of the relationship between SMMS and Wesley House and it will go a long in further strengthening the relationship.

Meanwhile, Prof Kumalo has been recognised by the University of KwaZulu-Natal for long service to the university.

In a letter to Prof Kumalo, Acting Executive Director of Human Resources at the university, Mr Kishore Gobardan, said the institution acknowledged and appreciated Prof Kumalo’s “dedication, commitment and extensive contribution to the university”.

Prof Kumalo has been serving UKZN for the past 15 years.