Alumni have complimentary access to the HDS Library and to ATLASerials®, an online collection of more than 70 major religion and theology journals. To gain access to the library and the ATLASerials® database, send an email to alums@hds.harvard.edu that includes your full name and degree year. After a member of the staff has verified that you are a graduate of the School, you will be sent login information to access the database.

Students across faith traditions prepare for health care, university, military and prison chaplaincy. Students explore various forms of chaplaincy through Field Education placements. HDS offers courses in chaplaincy, counseling, ethics, and child and adult development, and spiritual psychology. Additionally, students may earn field education credit for units of Clinical Pastoral Education.

Harvard Divinity School does not accept transfer credits. However, after satisfactory completion of at least one full semester of coursework at HDS, students in the MDiv program may be considered for advanced standing for work completed at another institution prior to enrollment at HDS. Guidelines and information about obtaining advanced standing are provided in the HDS Handbook for Students.

In the Jewish tradition, one becomes a rabbi after receiving “smicha,” or ordination, from the rabbinical seminaries of the different movements of American Judaism (Reform, Conservative, Reconstructionist, Orthodox), from an independent rabbinical school, or privately from an individual rabbi. Read more about Jewish ordination