2026-2027 Faculty Research Grants

Rodney Palmer (Religion). 

They Served Too: Archival Biographical Research on Jamaican Seventh-day Adventist Women Lay Preachers for ESDA Online.

This project will produce historically grounded biographical articles on outstanding Seventh-day Adventists in Jamaica for publication in the Encyclopedia of Seventh-day Adventists (ESDA Online), with special emphasis on female lay-preachers whose contributions have received little to no formal documentation or public recognition in denominational histories and published sources. The study is based on primary-source research conducted on-site in Jamaica in the archives of the West Jamaica Conference of Seventh-day Adventists, the East Jamaica Conference of Seventh-day Adventists, and the Jamaica Union Conference of Seventh-day Adventists. Drawing on executive committee minutes, annual reports, correspondence, departmental reports (education, health, youth, publishing, women’s ministries), institutional records, and photographs (as permitted), the project will identify influential Jamaican Adventists—especially undermentioned female lay-preachers—and reconstruct their roles in church growth. Research will be conducted using standard historical methods: systematic source identification, document logging and citation, cross-checking for accuracy, and contextual interpretation within Jamaican religious and social history. By foregrounding women whose labor and leadership have often been overlooked, this work will preserve and make accessible Jamaican Adventist heritage for a global audience and provide a foundation for future scholarly articles and public-history collaborations.