Yellowstone Baptist College

Yellowstone Baptist College is a four year undergraduate theological college. Our mission is to develop Christian leaders who will be obedient to Christ’s Great Commission to “make disciples of all nations” (Matthew. 28:18-20). YBC is the only Southern Baptist Convention college in the Northwest.

 YBC serves the needs of an area of the country which is very different from most of the United States. Most of the Northwest is sparsely populated except in a few widely separated cities. In addition, because of our location, we have an obligation to address the special needs of students from our area of the United States as well as the needs of Native American students. We are located in Billings, Montana, central to all the following Reservations: Crow, Northern Cheyenne, Fort Belknap, Fort Peck, Blackfeet, Flathead, Benewah, Nez Perce, Fort Hall, Wind River, Pine Ridge, Cheyenne River, Standing Rock, Fort Berthold, and a number of tribal lands in Canada just over the Montana border.

A challenge we deal with is the necessity of providing quality education to students who come from rural areas and small communities where the average income is very low. A college education at most colleges is too expensive for many of our students and is certainly too expensive for almost all Native Americans who live on the reservations. In order to meet the needs of students from these small communities and reservations, Yellowstone Baptist College is committed to keeping the cost of an education as low as possible and is committed to making scholarships, financial aid, and jobs available in an effort to assure that no one graduates with unpaid debts. We at YBC recognize the fact that our students cannot afford to serve in the churches on the reservations, in the small Northwest communities, or on the mission fields if they finish school with debt from a student loan obligation.

Our graduates also face another challenge resulting from the fact that a student who earns a Christian Leadership degree cannot afford to return to his community or to the reservation to serve in a church unless he or she has some skill that will open up an opportunity for meaningful employment. Most of the pastors in small churches work to supplement the stipend they receive from their church, and obtaining a two year associate degree from a technical college is the best way to prepare for a meaningful job in the areas where they will live and serve. Yellowstone Baptist College, in conjunction with Montana State University-Billings College of Technology, has developed a program that will allow a student at Yellowstone Baptist College to transfer credits to the college of technology if they choose to acquire a two year technical degree in addition to their degree from Yellowstone Baptist College. This has been done primarily as a means of making it possible for American Indian students and others to return to the reservations or small communities, able to support a family, and make a real impact.

God is doing something very special at YBC. Twenty percent of our students have spent the summer working in missions all over the world in places such as Australia, Bolivia, East Asia, Mexico, Niger, Montana, and Wales. You can visit with us online at www.yellowstonebaptist.edu and by e-mail at ybc@yellowstonebaptist.edu