Raised in historic Birmingham, AL, Rev. Dr. Jennifer Lynn Oliver has been described as a down-to-earth individual, who is committed to excellence in everything that she does. She attended Mary Baldwin College in Staunton, VA where she earned a BS in Chemistry. Once completing her BS, she returned to Birmingham, working briefly for UAB Hospital Dept of Preventive Medicine and then obtaining a job as a Chemistry Teacher in the Birmingham City School System. While teaching she received a Master’s of Education with emphasis in Secondary Education-Chemistry and successfully completed the Urban Teacher’s Education Program. After only 5 years of teaching, Jennifer went on to pursue a Doctor of Philosophy in Food Science from Alabama A&M University, which she received in December 2011. Dr. Oliver spent three years working as an academic research scientist and adjunct professor at Alabama A&M University in the Dept of Food and Animal Sciences as well as the Dept of Chemistry, Mathematics, and Physics at A&M and Calhoun Community College. During her tenure at A&M, she has authored six and co-authored over 20 peer-reviewed articles in research areas ranging from food safety and security, nutritional toxicology, colon cancer prevention, and functional food product development. Currently, she holds adjunct teaching positions in the Natural Sciences and Mathematic Department at California Baptist University.
Jennifer earned a M.Div. from Fuller Theological Seminary, with an emphasis in Worship, Theology, and the Arts and International Development and Urban Studies in 2019. She integrates her background in agriculture and food science into ministry to aide in transforming communities by filling need gaps in the area of hunger, poverty, and clean water, both domestically and global through her food systems solutions consulting firm Dixon & Dukely, LLC and its nonprofit arm Manna Movement Collaborative. She is an advocate for community health and wellness, serving as the director for the Vernon Johns Food Justice Initiative for the Faith Community Coalition. Her purpose in life is to help individuals restore connection to God, themselves, the earth, and each other in community so that all might be transformed into embodied vessels of love, to be agents of transformation in the world. Rev. Dr. Oliver, an ordained itinerant elder in the AME church, previously served as an associate minister at First AME Church, Pasadena. She is also mother to 17-year-old daughter, Jordan.