Dr. R. Drew Smith
Topic:
R. Drew Smith, Director
The Public Influences of African-American Churches Project
Scholar-in-Residence, The Leadership Center
R. Drew Smith is Scholar-in-Residence at the Leadership Center at Morehouse College,Atlanta, GA. In this capacity, he has initiated and directed a number of projects related to religion and public life, including the Public Influences of African-American Churches Project and the Faith Communities and Urban Families Project. These Projects have collected research data on political involvements, community development activities, and outreach ministries of African-American churches in numerous parts of the United States. The Projects have also convened seminars, conferences, and roundtables that have brought clergy, policy makers, and community leaders together to discuss matters pertaining to the church’s public mission and ministry. In addition to his own work on religion and public life, Dr. Smith has served on the advisory boards of other academic and nongovernmental organizations concerned with religion and public life, including the Pew Partnership for Civic Change, the Institute for Church Administration and Management, Calvin College’s Institute for the Study of Christianity and Politics, and Notre Dame University’s Center for the Study of Latino Religion.
Dr. Smith is a political scientist who has taught at Indiana University, Butler University, Case Western Reserve University, and New York Theological Seminary. Dr. Smith has been actively involved in international community development and youth leadership development, initially as an executive staff person at Operation Crossroads Africa during the 1980s. He has traveled widely in Africa and Latin America, with his Africa involvements taking him to twenty African countries since the mid-1980s. Most recently, he served in 2005 as a Fulbright Professor at the University of Pretoria in South Africa. He has also lectured in many international venues, including Brazil, Cameroon, Ghana, South Africa, and lectured in Israel in Spring of 2007 as part of the U.S. State Department’s Speakers Bureau. In addition, Dr. Smith is a Baptist clergyman, and has ministered in a number of parish, prison, and campus ministry contexts.