The Passport Christian summer camp organization has announced the three recipients of its Chester Phelps Passport Seminary Scholarships for the 2023-24 academic year.
Jessalyn Brown of Baylor University’s Truett Theological Seminary, Sophia Carter of the Wake Forest University School of Divinity and Paxton Vaughn of the Duke University Divinity School will share $6,000 in scholarship funds.
Passport’s scholarship fund has been created in cooperation with River Road Church, Baptist in Richmond, Va., and supported by annual budgeted funds and donors.
Jessalyn Brown
The scholarship fund, which is in its third year, was named for Chester Phelps, a longtime minister of River Road Church, who took many student groups to Passport’s camps across three decades. He joined the church’s staff in 1984 as minister to preschoolers, children and staff and retired in 2004 as minister of youth. He subsequently served in two interim ministry positions.
“With the high cost of seminary, Passport and River Road share the goal of wanting students who are called to ministry to be able to pursue their theological education without undue financial burden,” Passport announced in a statement. “The main requirement for recipients is to complete a summer ministering on staff at Passport Camps successfully.”
Paxton Vaughn
Passport President David Burroughs praised Brown, Carter and Vaughn.
“These students did a wonderful job ministering with us this past summer at Passport,” he said. “We are so pleased to be able to help out in a small way with the cost of their seminary education and so thankful to River Road Church for continuing to make these scholarships available.”
Brown is a third-year student at Truett Seminary, where she is pursuing a Master of Divinity degree with a concentration in preaching. She served one summer with Passport Camps as the youth pastor.
Sophia Carter
She now is a resident chaplain on the Baylor campus, serving students in Heritage House, the fine arts community home to students with artistic interests.
Carter is a second-year Wake Forest Divinity student, also working on a Master of Divinity degree. She served one summer with Passport Camps as the mission project coordinator.
She now serves in multiple capacities, including as worship leader at Wake Forest University, church administrator at Wesley Memorial United Methodist Church in Winston-Salem, N.C., and youth minister at Emerywood Baptist Church in High Point, N.C.
Vaughn is a second-year student at Duke Divinity School, where she also is studying for a Master of Divinity degree. She has served three summers with Passport Camps as missions coordinator and assistant director.
She is a Cooperative Baptist Fellowship of North Carolina campus ministry specialist in Raleigh, N.C.