At Pittsburgh Theological Seminary’s 2024 Alumnae/i Days gathering, four alums were honored for their work and recognized as this year’s distinguished alumnae/i or received The Fred Rogers Award for Creative Ministry. In this blog series, meet these alums and discover the ways in which they serve God and neighbor in their communities and across the nation. The 2024 recipient of the Fred McFeely Rogers Award for Creative Ministry is The Rev. Kendra Buckwalter Smith ’12/’13.
The Fred McFeely Rogers Awardee for Creative Ministry: The Rev. Kendra Buckwalter Smith
The Rev. Kendra Buckwalter Smith has served since 2012 as the director of the Worship Program at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary, equipping students for Christian ministries as faithful, thoughtful, and hospitable worshipers and worship leaders through weekly chapel services and additional seasonal worship services. During the academic year, Kendra directs up to a dozen student worship leaders in planning and leading all aspects of worship. In 2022, she secured a Vital Worship Grant from the Calvin Institute of Christian Worship for use in the Seminary’s Worship Program.
Since 2019, Kendra has also been the associate pastor of discipleship at Shadyside Presbyterian Church (Pittsburgh), where she provides spiritual care to youth and families and participates in worship leadership. Her primary responsibilities include oversight of the Sunday morning Christian education classes and curriculum for students in 6th-12th grades as well as the afternoon Shadyside Presbyterian Youth Sundays (SPYS) program. She has previously worked as director of children and youth ministry at Glenshaw Presbyterian Church, as the children’s bell choir director at Shadyside, and as a sermon researcher for Docent Research Group.
Kendra has also been a leader in a variety of ways in the PC(USA). She was on the editorial advisory board for the Book of Common Worship from 2015 to 2018, is active in leadership roles for the Presbyterian Association of Musicians, and is on the Pittsburgh Presbytery’s Commission on Preparation for Ministry. Kendra has instructed multiple students at PTS in independent studies related to spiritual formation, liturgy, music, and worship. She is frequently sought after to plan and lead worship for large gatherings and conferences in the PC(USA) and to speak and lead workshops on liturgy and worship arts. She has written pieces published in Connections Worship Companion, Call to Worship, Hymns and Hymnody: Historical and Theological Introductions, These Days: Daily Devotions for Living by Faith, Presbyterians Today, and Encyclopedia of Christianity in the United States.
Kendra earned a B.A. in music and religious studies and a certificate in medieval and Renaissance studies at the University of Pittsburgh and both a Master of Divinity and Master of Sacred Theology at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary. As a PTS student in 2011, she received the Valentour World Travel Fellowship, allowing her to travel to Africa to study worship music. She was also awarded the Watson Samuel Boyce Music Prize for the most outstanding contribution to the life of the Seminary in the area of church music and the Walter P. and Anna L. McConkey Award in Homiletics.
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