The Seminary's grant research profile has grown while focusing on a number of strategically important fields of study. Use the interactive directory below to learn more about research projects.
- March 2024
The Polaris Young Adult Leadership Network seeks to cultivate community among young adult Christian leaders, amplify their ministries in a variety of local contexts, and inspire other young adults to lead from their own Christian faith. The network will begin in 2023 with a fellowship program. Fellows ages 23-29 will be nominated from across the country to participate in a year-long leadership acceleration cohort to build relationships with each other and strengthen their local ministry projects. Participants will receive coaching and subgrants to accelerate local ministry projects along with funding to visit leaders who have sparked their Christian imagination. An array of publicly available opportunities will also be available for young adults to hone their leadership skills, discern their calling, and amplify their stories in public life. Alongside work with young adults, the network will engage an extensive research and mapping project to learn from organizations who serve and inspire young adult Christian leaders. Learnings will be publicly shared so that pastors, parents, educators, and young adults themselves can better understand the landscape and scope of vibrant Christian leadership among people in their 20s.
Kenda Creasy Dean, Mary D. Synnott Professor of Youth, Church, and Culture
Abigail Visco Rusert, Associate Dean of Continuing Education
Shari Oosting
- December 2021
The Ministry Collaboratory @ Princeton (the Collaboratory) disseminates findings and creates resources emerging from Princeton Theological Seminary’s recently completed young adult innovation hub, The Zoe Project (2017-2021). Various strategies for young adult/congregational collaboration will be tested in 90 congregations clustered in 30 different communities. The Collaboratory will also develop a suite of learning tools to help young adults and congregations empathize, collaborate, and innovate together more effectively.
SENIOR FACULTY STRATEGIST
Kenda Creasy Dean, Mary D. Synnott Professor of Youth, Church, and Culture and faculty liaison to the Institute for Youth Ministry
- November 2021
The Institute for Youth Ministry secured a grant from the Fuller Youth Institute to create Christian education curriculum on neurodiversity and faith formation in youth ministry. The curriculum aims to equip leaders to shape congregations in which young people of all neurotypes flourish. The project is part of Fuller Youth Institute’s “Character-Forming Youth Discipleship” project, funded by The John Templeton Foundation.
PROJECT LEADER
Abigail Rusert, Director of Program Design and the Institute for Youth Ministry
CO-LEADERS
Michael Paul Cartledge, PhD Candidate
Erin Raffety, Empirical Research Consultant
- November 2021
The Isaiah Partnership: Pastors Leading Innovation will test two models of pastoral leadership formation that foster innovation and change in, with, and through congregations. These models will inform how Princeton Theological Seminary prepares students in degree and non-degree programs to lead innovation and catalyze change in their communities and by mobilizing lay persons in congregations. Concurrently, this project will engage Princeton Seminary faculty in creating a theological framework for innovation and change leadership, in which innovation is understood as participation in God’s “new thing” in Jesus Christ (Isa. 43:19).
PROJECT LEADER
Abigail Rusert, Director of Program Design and the Institute for Youth Ministry
- September 2020
Under the leadership of Rev. Joanne Rodriguez, Hispanic Theological Initiative director, this project aims to strengthen and advance an online, peer-reviewed bilingual presence for articles and book reviews of Latinx scholars.
LEADER
Joanne Rodriguez, Director of the Hispanic Theological Initiative
- December 2019
Princeton Theological Seminary requested a 3-year grant to establish the “Imagining Church” project. In the first phase, digital ethnography was undertaken to develop portraits of 23 thriving congregations from among a variety of candidates recommended by denominational leaders and fellow ecclesial researchers. The aim was to expand upon the seven key characteristics of thriving congregations, as identified by previous researchers, by helping to identify That Extra Special Something (TESS), which researchers claim “is probably the most important factor” in breathing life into a congregation and its ministries.
CO-DIRECTORS
Gordon Mikosky, Associate Professor of Christian Education
Erin Raffety, Empirical Research Consultant
“One of the biggest lessons I learned was how to be charitable to views other than my own. Christian charity was shown to me, not just in the readings for class, but from the professors, and the Seminary community.”