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CONNECT WITH US: Share your accomplishments, career advancements, family news, celebrations, and other life events through Liberty’s Class Notes. Visit www.Liberty.edu/ClassNotes. Submissions will be published online and may be featured in the Liberty Journal.

Aviation graduate honored with Pilot of the Year Award

Growing up only half a mile from the local airport in Fayette, Ala., Greg Maddox (’14) spent his childhood watching technicians work on the planes that would fly over his house. It only made sense that Maddox would grow up to become a pilot, flying Cobra attack helicopters for the United States Army (1983-89) and piloting helicopters for health care companies. Maddox is currently the lead pilot for Wellmont Health System in Kingsport, Tenn.

The father of two received the Pilot of the Year Award from The National EMS Pilots Association at a national award ceremony in Charlotte, N.C., in September. Maddox was recognized for his heroic actions during a June 2016 emergency helicopter landing in Johnson County, Tenn. When the helicopter’s engine malfunctioned, Maddox’s quick thinking saved the lives of the crew and a patient they were transporting.

Maddox said his crew was dispatched to a car wreck to tend to a patient. They loaded up the helicopter and took off. At 100 feet, Maddox realized something was seriously wrong.

“I heard these five loud bangs, and then there was smoke,” Maddox said. “Something just told me to veer in a certain direction so we were away from all the power lines.”

Maddox landed the helicopter hard onto a nearby parking lot, but there were no major injuries.

“The Lord was with us that day,” he said.

Maddox graduated with a B.S. in Aeronautics through Liberty’s online program. He said he grew up learning about the vision for Liberty University by watching “The Old-Time Gospel Hour,” an evangelistic television program that aired from the late 1950s through the early 2000s and featured the Rev. Jerry Falwell Sr., Liberty’s founder.

Once, on the way to Washington, D.C., for a family vacation as a child, Maddox said his family stopped in Lynchburg. “I have always admired Liberty,” Maddox said. “I wanted to go to a university where I could learn from a biblical perspective. I’m so grateful for this school.”

Alumnus serves community as interim sheriff, runs for election

Don Sloan (’82, ’87, and ’90) has built a life and career in Lynchburg over the last 39 years. Originally from Oregon, he and his twin brother, Ron, came to Liberty Baptist College in January 1978. While pursuing a ministry degree, Sloan began working in the college’s emergency services department, which would eventually become the Liberty University Police Department.

“I had two older brothers who were deputies back in Oregon,” Sloan said. “Growing up, I had always been around law enforcement, but I never intended to go into it as a career.”

He graduated with a bachelor’s degree in religion in 1982 and later earned a Master of Arts in Counseling and Master of Divinity from Liberty, as well.

Working for the university’s police force started out as a way to help pay his tuition, but Sloan quickly found himself moving up the ranks. He served as Chief of Police for LUPD from 1997 to 2001, working closely with Liberty’s founder, the Rev. Jerry Falwell Sr., who made a big impact on his life.

“Dr. Falwell was consistent with people. It didn’t matter who you were,” he said. “I would see him meet with presidents and diplomats, and he would turn around and talk to me the exact same way.”

In 2002, Sloan was appointed Chief Deputy Sheriff for the City of Lynchburg under Sheriff Ron Gillispie and has been serving as interim sheriff since Gillispie’s retirement in March. He is one of two candidates running on the Republican ticket for the City of Lynchburg in the June 13 primary.

Though he serves the city, Sloan has stayed close to his Liberty family by teaching the university’s gun safety courses (required for concealed carry permit holders to carry on campus), helping with security details for larger campus events, and teaching a theology course online. His son now attends Liberty, while his wife, Carla, is an instructor in the College of General Studies.

Despite his Pacific Northwest roots, Sloan sees Lynchburg as his home now.

“When you care about something, you want to take care of it in the best way possible,” he said. “Lynchburg is something I care about, and I want to serve the community where I basically grew up.”

Sloan uses his ministry background to do that.

“Like in ministry, law enforcement officers meet people in crisis,” he said. “I’ve talked with plenty of people during my time in law enforcement who needed the love of Jesus.”

Liberty Law alumna named partner at Minnesota law firm

When the parents of Kristal Dahlager learned their unborn daughter had a condition that would require a caretaker her entire life, they refused the doctors’ recommendation for an abortion.

Born with arthrogryposis, a condition that causes limited movement in the joints and lack of muscle, Dahlager has been wheelchair bound since she was a child. But that didn’t stop her from attending Liberty University School of Law, more than 22 hours from her hometown of Sacred Heart, Minn., and reaching her career goals.

After graduating in 2012, Dahlager returned to Minnesota, where she took the bar exam, passed, and became an attorney at the prestigious Anderson Larson Saunders & Klaassen in Willmar, Minn. In January, she was promoted to partner. She practices in real estate transactions, estate and business planning, probate, and Social Security disability law.

“I’ve always loved helping people because I am so dependent on others,” she said. “I may not be able to help my clients physically, but I can help them with my mind.”

Dahlager said she first desired to become a lawyer in high school, but thought she was too reserved to go into the profession.

“I was scared away by the fictional portrayal of lawyers in Hollywood,” she said. “I thought you had to be really aggressive. But I learned later on that as a lawyer, you’re an advocate for your clients.”

Dahlager earned her undergraduate degree in statistics and actuarial science from the University of Minnesota Duluth and began at Liberty Law in 2009.

The top reason she chose Liberty Law was for its Christian worldview.

“We had friends from our church back home who had gone to Liberty,” she said. “I really wanted to attend a school with a biblical worldview.”

While at Liberty, Dahlager served as a staff member of the Law Review, a member of the Alternate Dispute Resolution Board, treasurer of the Student Bar Association, and a prayer mentor for incoming law students.

“Law school is not an easy task,” Dahlager said. “Though the professors pushed us, they were so encouraging. The students would come together and pray with one another. There was so much love and support.”

Brothers follow their dreams as members of White House press corps

For brothers Kadesh (left) and Mike DuBose, their interest in media began in childhood, when they toured broadcasting studios around Chicago.

Their parents homeschooled them and were always exploring opportunities for their sons to learn from professionals in different fields.

“Our parents had childhood friends who went to work for Oprah and Steve Harvey,” Mike DuBose said. “They took us to their studios. We always felt comfortable around cameras.”

In high school, while living on the outskirts of Washington, D.C., the brothers started their own production company. Their first big job was covering an appearance by then-President Barack Obama at a local grocery store near their house.

“It was a God thing,” Mike DuBose said. “The rest is history after that.”

They soon became freelancers for a variety of media outlets that hired them to broadcast or photograph news from the White House. Now, the siblings share office space near the North Lawn; they earned their hard credentials last year, which allow them to be stationed there as members of the press corps.

“It’s surreal,” Kadesh DuBose said. “You’re respected for your work and get to document things in real time. Even if it’s a bad day, you’re still working at the White House.”

Mike works on the broadcast side and has freelanced for clients such as the EPA and Fox News. Kadesh focuses on still photography and was asked by Associated Press journalist C. Anthony Miller help design a mural that features those who have worked in the press corps for at least 10 years; the piece was signed by Obama and is now on display in the White House press room.

As for daily life at the White House, the Duboses said each workday is different.

“I compare it to a fire station,” Mike DuBose said. “Sometimes you’re sitting around waiting for something to happen. Other days it’s crazy, and you’re running around nonstop.”

Mike earned his bachelor’s degree in interdisciplinary studies from Liberty’s online program in 2015. Kadesh is set to graduate this year with the same degree. Mike DuBose said he applied to three colleges after high school. Liberty wasn’t his first choice.

“Then I came and visited, and I just fell in love with it,” he said. “Ironically, on the first day I was enrolled in online classes, I was visiting the White House with my dad. I never knew that’s where I’d end up. It’s been beyond a blessing for us both.”

Alumna helps to heal Haiti one family at a time

Elisa Bachmann (’16) said she wanted her life’s work to have purpose. She found that purpose on a trip to Haiti in 2012 with the nonprofit organization Healing Haiti.

“I thought, ‘I have to move here, I’ve got to be involved in this because I love every aspect of this ministry,’” Bachmann said. “The people of Haiti are amazing. They have such resilience.”

She moved there later that year and now serves as the director of partner and child development for Healing Haiti. The Christ-centered ministry “leverages resources to elevate and unify Haitian families,” according to its website. Across Haiti, Bachmann said there are about 32,000 children living in orphanages. About 80 percent have living parents who lack the means to care for their children financially. Healing Haiti is tackling this problem by creating jobs (it recently opened a bakery and a pizza shop) so that parents are empowered to care for their children. The organization also operates family-style homes, where staff can give guidance to Haitian parents.

“We don’t want to do for Haitians what they can do for themselves,” Bachmann said. “That just means if there’s something that can be done for a family, we want to be part of walking alongside them, not doing it for them.”

After she moved to Haiti, Bachmann decided to pursue her M.A. in Marriage and Family Therapy through Liberty’s online program. She said she was especially motivated to study family counseling after speaking with a family who had been displaced by the deadly 2010 earthquake and was living in a tent city. She is using her counseling degree in the family-style homes and works directly with the children, using play therapy to help them cope with trauma.

“Children in Haiti who have come to an orphanage have gone through some sort of trauma,” she said. “Whether it’s small or big, it matters.”

Bachmann was one of 120 representatives from 52 nonprofits and organizations who visited campus in February as part of the university’s biannual Global Focus Week. Bachmann said she loved talking with students who were interested in working on the mission field.

“One of the things I love about Liberty’s Global Focus Week is that it is focused on sending missionaries from every background,” Bachmann said. “It’s not just Bible majors or pastoral majors, but people who say, ‘Man, I have a business degree, and I would love to use this knowledge for the Kingdom.’ Those are the people we need.”

Prison chaplain ministers to terminally ill inmates

When alumnus and current graduate student Adrian Dirschell (’14) was asked to serve as a chaplain for the Michigan Department of Corrections, he initially declined. However, he soon felt God tugging at his heart.

A month later, Dirschell was offered the position again, and this time he accepted — on one condition: that he could fulfill the spiritual needs of terminally ill inmates.

His request was granted, and he was stationed at the Charles E. Egeler Reception and Guidance Center in Jackson, Mich., a maximum-security prison that acts as a working hospital and hospice. Dirschell said that God revealed to him the loneliness prisoners feel when they die in prison, and he decided to make sure terminally ill inmates did not die alone.

“This has been a calling from God,” Dirschell said. “I have thrown myself in and opened my heart.”

Dirschell established a program that gives dying inmates 24-hour hospice care, ensuring that they are not left alone during their last days. His ministry, On Eagle’s Wings, focuses on dignity therapy, including writing a biography for each dying prisoner to leave their loved ones.

“It’s a chance for them to tell their stories on their terms,” Dirschell says.

He also works with 54 prisoners who are enrolled in the CHOICES (Choose, Health Options, Initiate Care, and Educate Self) program for inmates with chronic illness. About 14 of those inmates are enrolled in CHOICES II, which supports those with a life expectancy of six months or less.

After working in the corrections systems for more than 20 years, Dirschell knows that inmates will pretend to be something they’re not in order to seem tougher. But when they are diagnosed with a terminal disease, they change.

“All the walls are gone,” Dirschell said. “We can just come together as people.”

Earning a B.S. in Religious Studies through Liberty’s online program helped Dirschell fulfill God’s calling on his life. He said the professors encouraged him and provided resources for him to continue his ministry. Dirschell is currently pursuing an M.Div. in Biblical Studies through the Rawlings School of Divinity.

In MemoriAm

Shinjae Park

On March 13, two days before her 23rd birthday, junior Shinjae Park tragically lost her life in a car accident in South Carolina. Park and three other Liberty students were headed to Florida for Spring Break when their car lost traction, left I-95 and struck some trees. Park was riding in the back seat and died at the scene. The other students suffered various injuries.

Park’s death shocked and saddened her classmates, friends, and church family at 701 Korean Church in Lynchburg.

“A caring person,” the Rev. Nak Jung Kim said of Park. “She would always ask, ‘How are you doing?'”

Timothy Chong, dean of the Liberty’s Center for Asian Ministries, said, “I always found her to be joyful and very kind. It was fun to be around her.”
Park’s family traveled from her native South Korea to Lynchburg after her death. Chong said the family was grateful for the support they received from Liberty.

“In their tears, the parents received comfort in seeing that Shinjae had lived happily in such a good and safe environment at the school, with friends, faculty and staff, and at her apartment.”

The Department of Family & Consumer Sciences presented the Park family with a memory book. Park was studying family and child development.

Timothy Adams

On Saturday, March 4, in Warren, Ohio, Leonard Adams was told that his brother, Tim, a Global Studies student on an internship in Indonesia, had died. With that, the last of his immediate family was gone. The brothers had already seen both of their parents pass away.

“My brother and I were always close,” Leonard said. “But it pretty much locked the deal that we were best friends after we buried my father in 2013. He was my prayer partner.”

Tim Adams spent nine years in the Army, doing one tour in Iraq and two in Afghanistan. Leonard said that though his brother was a gym rat with a muscular build, he was also a quiet and humble man.

That Saturday in Indonesia, Tim Adams was swimming with friends and some children. The tide rose quickly, and they were caught in a rip current. Adams put the youngest child on his shoulders and swam hard. Another man was able to reach them and take the child, who was still clutching Adams’ cap. Then Adams disappeared into the water.

“That’s exactly who he was, the way he died,” said Leonard. “He’s been like that all his life. He’d give the shirt off his back to a stranger just because he saw him suffering. He didn’t do that out of military training; he did that out of the heart of Christ.” Later, Leonard heard from the boy’s father.

“All he kept saying was, ‘Tim was a hero,’ and that he couldn’t thank God enough for what Tim did for his son.”

Liberty honored Tim Adams at Commencement, where he was awarded a posthumous Bachelor of Science degree in Global Studies. Liberty’s Office of Military Affairs is also setting up a scholarship in Adams’ honor.