Liberty to select ‘Parent of the Year’

The Liberty Family and Parent Connections office will choose one parent to honor for the third annual award

Whether it is waking up early in the morning to change a soiled diaper or forking out a small fortune to make sure children have the best of the best, the word sacrifice hardly shows the love and compassion that parents have for their child.

For Liberty University, it has become a great honor to welcome parents and family out to Family Weekend each year. For the past three years, Liberty has also had the tradition of honoring a student’s parents for the sacrifices they have endured to send their child to school.

Director of the Family and Parent Connections office, Theresa Dunbar, announced that they will be hosting the Parent of the Year Award contest again this year.

Over 293 families have registered to attend this year, with an expected attendance of over 2,000 family members, Dunbar said.

“The purpose is for families to come and reconnect with their student,” Dunbar said. “We want Liberty to be a family school.”

The idea for the Parent of the Year Award, according to Dunbar, actually originated from studying parent weekends at other colleges, specifically Virginia Tech.

Senior Vice President for Student Affairs Mark Hine observed what Virginia Tech did for their parent weekend, and after seeing their parent award, he suggested ideas that helped form Liberty’s Parent of the Year contest.

Dunbar refers to the parent award as a “warm fuzzy,” giving students the opportunity to honor their parents.

With over 70 essays already submitted, students observe everything that their parents have done for them. The winner of the contest each year not only wins a variety of prizes, including meal points and gift cards, but also awards their parents a two-night stay at the Wingate for Family Weekend.

Parents and student will also be honored and awarded prizes during the Family Weekend banquet.

“Liberty believes that all the parents are special, that they have all worked and sacrificed to get their students here,” Dunbar said.

The Parent of the Year essay contest will continue to accept applicants until midnight on Sunday, Sept. 16.

For more information, including the form for submitting the essay, go to the Parent and Family Connections page at liberty.edu, or contact Theresa Dunbar at tdunbar@liberty.edu.