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Debra C. Brill retired on Oct. 1, 2019, after serving the Seventh-day Adventist Church in North America as a vice president for 21 years. Brill served as administrative liaison and chair of NAD committees and on the boards many NAD ministries. Brill, with 33 years of denominational employment, currently holds the record for longest-serving vice president of the NAD, and she is the second women to occupy a vice president position at the division.

NAD education leaders were recently part of an assessment team that traveled to Malawi to evaluate the educational needs at ADRA-sponsored schools. The schools are located in the poorest areas of one of the least-developed nations in Africa.

This fall, Adventist Community Services (ACS) and the Alaska Conference, part of the North Pacific Union Conference, announced that during the 2019 holiday season, ACS is providing a year-end match opportunity to help offset the costs of reaching native villages and enabling more children to experience camp, food programs, and Vacation Bible School (VBS). Every dollar AMA raises, ACS will match dollar for dollar, up to $100,000, by December 31. “Instead of resigning ourselves to these challenges, NAD’s ACS has prayerfully decided to engage in a transformational opportunity of collaboration with the AMA program,” said Tandi Perkins, Alaska Conference development director. “This partnership will focus on providing safe spaces and programs through outreach to Alaska Native communities.” 

In the autumn of 1969, Virginia-Gene Rittenhouse — already an accomplished and internationally-known violin and piano soloist and composer — invited four little kids to play music in her living room. Little did they know, this was the beginning of the New England Youth Ensemble (NEYE), a group of young musicians that gave its first performance at the local Kiwanis club in Worcester, Massachusetts.