The Asia-Pacific Region installed Kwon Dong-Hwan as the new director of the Manila-based World Mission Communications Center (WMC-AP). 

About 50 participants attended the special ceremony June 7 to witness and affirm the appointment of Kwon. Guests included Korean ministry partners and their spouses from Presbyterian, Methodist, and Nazarene churches in both Korea and the Philippines, Asia-Pacific Regional Director Verne Ward III, and students, faculty, and staff of Asia-Pacific Nazarene Theological Seminary and WMC-AP.  

Regional Communications Coordinator Doug Flemming sent video greetings from the regional office in Singapore.

"The timing is right to pass this baton of leadership," Flemming said. "Since 2005, Dr. Kwon has given skillful servant leadership to the Fairbanks International School of Communication at APNTS, and he has done a great job of teaching communications courses at other schools on the region, and developing fruitful partnerships for the school and region. So it is with great expectation that we also install Professor Kwon as the new director of the Manila-based WMC-AP facility." 

WMC-AP (formerly the Fairbanks Media Center) began in 1993 on the campus of Asia-Pacific Nazarene Theological Seminary to provide a regional facility for media production and training. As the ministry expanded, the Manila team moved into its current multimedia facility in November 2004. Under the leadership of Kwon, APNTS developed the Fairbanks International School of Communication (FISC) in 2009 to expand the offering of formal and non-formal media education and research services for the global church. 

Kwon will maintain his present duties as director of the FISC, including teaching communications courses at the seminary. Officials hope this integrated role creates more synergy between WMC-AP and FISC, allowing more communications students to be involved in production, especially those coming from diverse areas around the Asia Pacific Region. 

Working together, WMC-AP and FISC aim to better equip students in media to create their own productions in their native languages so they will be able to start media ministries in their own contexts. 

"As director of both the FISC program and the WMC-AP (Manila) operations, Kwon is well-situated to lead and expand both ministries into the future," it said in a statement from the regional office.
--Asia-Pacific Communications