New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary (NOBTS) is a Baptist theological institute in New Orleans, Louisiana. It is affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention. Missions and evangelism are core focuses of the seminary. NOBTS offers doctoral, master, bachelor, and associate degrees. The seminary has 13 graduate centers in 5 states, 11 undergraduate centers in 5 states, and 13 on-campus research centers. It has over 3,700 students and trains over 6,000 participants through workshops. NOBTS also has over 22,000 living alumni. The main campus is situated on over 70 acres with more than 70 buildings. History The Southern Baptist Convention founded the institution as the Baptist Bible Institute during the 1917 convention meeting in New Orleans. New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, or NOBTS for short, was the first institution created as a direct act of the Southern Baptist Convention. The institutes's purpose was centered on missionary work, and initially established as gateway to Central America. The Seminary started as the Baptist Bible Institute in the Garden District and later relocated to the current location in the heart of Gentilly. On May 17, 1946, the SBC revised the institutes' charter to enable it to become a seminary, and the name was changed to New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. Missions and evangelism have remained the core focus of the seminary. In the 1950s NOBTS relocated from Washington Avenue in the Garden District to a more spacious campus in the Gentilly neighborhood of New Orleans. The school purchased a pecan orchard and transformed it into what is now a bustling campus over 100 buildings, including academic buildings, faculty and staff housing, and student housing. The new campus was designed by noted Louisiana architect A. Hays Town. Hurricane Katrina, 2005 In August 2005, Hurricane Katrina forced the seminary to evacuate its staff and students. Within a few days, temporary offices were established in Decatur, Georgia. The NOBTS board of trustees overwhelmingly voted to keep the seminary in New Orleans and begin the necessary cleanup and repairs. The Southern Baptist Executive Committee provided 6.2 million dollars from the Southern Baptist Convention's Cooperative Program to the seminary following Hurricane Katrina. The money helped meet the budgetary requirements of the seminary and aided in the restoration effort. Many churches provided support clean-up and construction teams to assist the seminary in recovering. Following Katrina, the faculty resumed classes at extension centers and online through the Blackboard Learning System. 85% of