Sara Horn Joins CCS

We are delighted to report that Sara Horn will join us June 1 as our new Director of External Relations. Sara and her family will be moving to Anderson from Spring Hill, TN (suburban Nashville).

In this new role, Sara will be responsible for promoting and building awareness of the College’s undergraduate and graduate programs through various communication and social media channels.

In addition to her communication responsibilities, Sara will plan and coordinate various events for the College – including the National Conference on Preaching, Preaching Boot Camp, and other events – as well as oversee a development initiative for undergraduate and graduate scholarships in Christian Studies.

She began her writing career as director of news and media relations at Union University in Jackson, Tenn. (I had the privilege of hiring her for her first full-time job when she was a Union student and I was Executive VP at Union.) She was then invited to join the corporate communications staff at LifeWay Christian Resources in Nashville. She left LifeWay in mid-2005 to work from home as a writer and published author. She was a frequent contributor to Baptist Press, and freelanced for a variety of publications including Home Life, Christian Retailing and Preaching magazine.

In the last six years, Horn has written nine books, the majority as a ghostwriter or collaborator. Her first book in 2004, A Greater Freedom: Stories of Faith from Operation Iraqi Freedom, written with Oliver North, was a Gold Medallion nominee. In 2006, she founded a faith-based military wives support organization, Wives of Faith, as her husband prepared to deploy to Iraq as a Navy reservist. Horn’s most recent book, GOD Strong: A Military Wife’s Spiritual Survival Guide, was released by Zondervan in February. She has served as a columnist and feature writer for Military Spouse magazine where she was included in the “Who’s Who Among Military Spouses” for 2008.

Horn holds a bachelor’s of music degree with an emphasis in communication arts from Union University. She and her husband Cliff have one son who is nine years old. Horn begins her new position at Anderson June 1.

Sara Horn is one of the most gifted communicators in Baptist life today, and we are delighted to have someone of her considerable skills become part of our team. We are blessed to have a unique educational and ministry resource for the church here at Anderson University, and Sara will help us more effectively tell that story both regionally and nationally.

Goodbye Michele, Hello Kelli

Good news and bad news. First the bad.

Today was the last day in the office for Michele Bennett, our Director of External Relations. Michele has been with us about a year, and has done a fabulous job in helping to promote the Master of Ministry program. She's been wearing two hats, also serving as our Administrative Assistant. Michele is such a talented communicator, and now she'll be using those gifts as a senior communications person for Upward Sports, based in Spartanburg. Michele has contributed so much to our program, and I know the students join me in thanking her for her faithfulness and wishing her all God's best.

Now the good news: our new Administrative Assistant is Kelli Strickland, who joined us Monday. (She and Michele had a week of overlap to absorb a year's worth of information!) Kelli is a graduate of Georgia Southern and is wife to local pastor Charles "Bucky" Strickland. She's going to do a great job for us, and will be a helper and advocate for our students.

Dr. Cribb joins CCS

The College of Christian Studies will be pleased to welcome Dr. Bryan Cribb to its faculty this fall, as Assistant Professor of Christian Studies. He will primarily teach in the undergraduate program, but occasionally teach courses in the Clamp School as well.

Dr. Cribb is currently on the faculty of Brewton-Parker College, a Baptist school in Georgia. He and his family will be joining us in Anderson this summer, as he helps us prepare for the new Bachelor of Christian Studies degree program. (More on that later.)

He received his Ph.D. in Old Testament at Southern Baptist Seminary in Louisville. He also served as editor of the campus publication at Southern, and frequently wrote for Baptist Press.

Dr. Cribb is going to be a wonderful addition to our team at AU. We look forward to having him join us!

2010-2011 MMin Schedule

Looks like we have a schedule for the Master of Ministry program for the next academic year. The dates shown are when classes begin; classes will be offered on various days. For example, starting in the fall we'll have at least two (maybe three) online courses running sinultaneously, and two classroom courses running each week.

Term 1: Begins week of Aug 9; ends week of Oct 4
(holiday week of Sept 6)

Term 2: Begins week of Oct 11; ends week of Dec 6
(holiday for online courses week of Nov 22; classroom courses may be that week or week of Nov 16, working around SC Baptist Convention and Thanksgiving holidays)

Term 3: Begins week of Jan 3; ends week of Feb 21

Term 4: Begins week of Feb 28; ends week of Apr 25

May Term: Begins week of May 16; ends week of June 9

Great Day with Mark Batterson

We had a remarkable day with Mark Batterson on campus yesterday.

It actually began Tuesday evening, when Mark visited our Master of Ministry classroom as a guest speaker during the first session of our Communication for Ministry course. The pastor of National Community Church in DC (www.theaterchurch.com) talked about his experience with planting the DC church, and spoke at length about the use of the web and social networking tools in connecting people. (Mark has some experienec with that -- his blog gets 17 million hits a year!)

On Wednesday he spoke to an overflow crowd at campus worship, then spent an hour visiting with more than 100 students and participants in our new Young Leaders Network.

Mark Batterson is the kind of gifted leader and communicator we are blessed to involve in the M.Min. program here at Anderson. We look forward to having him back!