P. Jeffrey Conn, Phd ('81)

After graduating from Lee with a B.S. in Psychology, Jeff Conn attended Vanderbilt University where he completed his PhD in Pharmacology before entering Yale for his postdoctoral work. In 1988 he joined the faculty at Emory University where he was promoted to full professor while researching the relationship between neurotransmitter receptors and neurological disorders. In 2000 Dr. Conn joined Merck and Company as the Senior Director of neuroscience before returning to Vanderbilt in 2003 as the founding Director of the Vanderbilt Program in Translational Neuropharmacology and the Director of the Vanderbilt Center for Neuroscience Drug Discovery. Dr. Conn serves on numerous editorial boards and provides scientific oversight to several national organizations including the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s research. He is recognized as a pioneer for his innovative approach to drug discovery which calls for collaboration between research universities and drug companies in order to produce superior medical solutions. Dr. Conn is the Lee E. Limbird Professor of Pharmacology. Jeff was the 2008 Alumnus of the Year. He and his wife, Dr. Anita Ball Conn (‘81), have three children and live in the Nashville area.

Brad Blackmon ('98)

After finishing Lee with a BA in Communications and Public Relations, Brad went to work for a property management firm out of Chattanooga that took him to Madison, Wisconsin and Spartanburg, South Carolina. His skills as a motivator and team leader took him to the India based communications firm, Lowe Lintas, then to global advertising leader, Wunderman, where he oversaw the Microsoft account while living in London. Brad was promoted up through Wunderman finally reaching VP, Account Director at Washington based RTCRM, a subsidiary of Wunderman. One co-worker said of Brad, “He is a shining star in the agency world.”

In 2010 he spent a year at the Chicago-based agency Draftfcb before being recruitedby advertising giant Ogilvy and Mather to lead a development team responsible for North American print, TV and web advertising for blue-chip client IBM. Today Brad lives in Manhattan, NY with his wife, April (Nicole) Daniels Balckmon (’99), and their son.

Loran Livingston ('77)

The son of a North Carolina railroad worker, Loran Livingston grew up in Wadesboro, about 50 miles east of Charlotte. At the age of three his family joined the small congregation of L. L. Reeder and became members of the Church of God. It was at age of 7 that Loran first felt urgency toward God, but not until the spring semester of his freshman year at Lee, in 1971, did he have a conversion experience while sitting in the basement of Medlin Hall. Two days later, on March 28, he accepted his calling to be a minister.

In the summer of 1973 he married a young woman that he first met at church youth camp, Sandra Weatherby, the daughter of Rev. G. E. Weatherby. Soon after, the two left Lee to accept a Youth Evangelism position and Loran finished his degree through continuing education. Loran and Sandra spent their early ministry as evangelists traveling the state of Ohio.

It was in Ohio one evening in December of 1976 that Loran received a call from a group back in Charlotte asking him to minster the next Sunday. He did, and when that group called him every week for 3 months asking him to be their pastor he finally relented. In April 1977 Loran became the pastor of the newly formed 22-member Central Church.

Thirty-five years later Central Church has 7300 members and is the largest North American congregation in the Church of God. Loran can be heard each Sunday on the international radio program Forward in Faith, and is a familiar favorite in Lee University chapel. He has served on the Church of God Executive Council and is currently serving as a member of the North Carolina State Council. He and Sandra have four daughters and five grandchildren.

In 1991, Loran was named the Lee University Alumnus of the Year.

Cyndi Joiner ('82)

After graduating from Lee with a BA in Communications, Cyndi earned an MBA from Pfeiffer University and completed the School of Negotiations program at Harvard. In the business world she quickly developed a reputation for saving money by rethinking how the purchase of goods and services could be streamlined at the corporate level. Eventually her talents were spotted by the global finance giant GMAC, now Ally Financial, where she saved the company more than $150 million. In 2004 she went to work for the Chicago-based Huron Consulting before being hired by the turnaround management specialists, Alvarez & Marsal. Today Cyndi is a Managing Director at A&M and a 15-year consulting veteran credited with saving companies more than $350 million..

She and her husband, Randy (’80), live in Lawrenceville, Georgia.