Current Spurgeon's students will complete their courses under the existing agreement with the University of Wales.

The change came about after the University of Wales decided to stop validating courses at all other institutions after concerns over several centres overseas which ran courses leading to the university's degrees. Colleges affected by the change in strategy were given a notice period of one year.
 

Principal Dr Nigel Wright said Spurgeon's was delighted to have completed the agreement with the University of Manchester.

Manchester is not only a member of the Russell Group of elite academic institutions in the UK but is also ranked third in the most recent university Research Assessment Exercise (RAE), behind only Oxford and Cambridge.  Four recent rankings all put Manchester in the world top-fifty.

'This means that all new Spurgeon's students will benefit from knowing that their degrees are validated and conferred by one of the finest academic institutions in the world,' Dr Wright said.

'This, together with streamlining both our undergraduate and masters courses, makes us even more confident we will attract the best theology students in future and that our ministerial students get the best possible training.
 

'Manchester is very selective in which institutions they validate so this acceptance is a reward for our excellence.'

From September, Spurgeon's College's undergraduate courses will have the same content but they will be presented slightly differently. It will offer one honours degree, a BA in Theology, which may be studied in four different ways; namely church-based; college-based; non-vocational or online.

These routes may all be studied part-time, too.

For postgraduate students, the College will offer two masters degrees: the Master of Arts in Christian Thought and Practice, designed for students with an undergraduate degree in a subject other than theology; and a Master of Theology qualification, intended for those who already have a theology degree.

The International Baptist Theological Seminary also has its degrees validated by the University of Wales. A proposal to move IBTS from its base in Prague to Amsterdam and a relationship with the VU (Free) University in Amsterdam will be discussed at the EBF Council later this month.