2010s
Robert Griffin III, BA ’10, was voted for induction into the Texas Sports Hall of Fame Class of 2020. He plays for the National Football League’s Baltimore Ravens.
Melinda Adams, BMEd ’11, is a local southern rock musician who also works for the Waco Convention and Visitors Bureau. In an interview with KWBU-FM’s Fine Tuned Music Series, published Nov. 26, 2019, Adams discusses her influences, her trip abroad and how music plays into the economics of Waco and what could be on the horizon for the Central Texas music scene. Listen at https://www.kwbu.org/post/fine-tuned-music-series-melinda-adams#stream/0.
Wes Nemec, BBA ’11, returns for a third year as head coach of the Dallas Roughnecks, a professional ultimate frisbee team that competes in the American Ultimate Disc League (AUDL) with games televised on ESPN, showcasing the highest level of the sport. The Roughnecks reached the championship finals in each of the last two years. Nemec was part of the founding of the Baylor ultimate frisbee club team, and he later coached the team when he was a Baylor employee.
Jeffery Pennewell, BA ’11, MPP ’15, and his wife Danielle of Livermore, CA, were honored with the 2020 Martin Luther King Jr. Legacy Award from the Pleasanton Community of Character Collaborative for their project Words Matter, which was conceived as part of a “Choose Love” curriculum in Jeffery’s fifth-grade Spanish dual immersion class at Junction Avenue K-8 School. Students decorated small cards with motivation quotes and kind comments, then Jeffery and Danielle handed them out in San Francisco’s Union Square. The reactions of some of the recipients were recorded “in order to show the kids the impact of their work.”
D. Christopher Sloan, MHA ’11, MBA ’11, joined Capital Medical Center in Olympia, WA, as chief operating officer. He previously was with Madigan Army Medical Center in Washington, Andrew Rader Health Clinic in Virginia and Evans Army Community Hospital in Colorado.
BKD CPAs & Advisors added Tyler Whiteside, BBA/MAcc ’12, as a senior manager with BKD’s audit and assurance team, serving energy, manufacturing and distribution, and other businesses in the commercial sector. Whiteside previously was an assurance manager with an international CPA and advisory firm.
Miriam Hobma, BA ’13, and Cody Orr, BBA ’13, were married Oct. 20, 2019, in Tyler, TX. The two met their sophomore year when they joined Baylor Student Government.
Maj. Katie Odom, DSCOT ’13, was awarded the second-ever Martelet Cup for her team’s research from NATO’s Interallied Confederation of Medical Officers at their Summer Congress in Tallinn, Estonia. Odom is an exercise and training development officer for the U.S. Army 3rd Medical Training Brigade, Medical Readiness and Training Command at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio. She specializes in conducting research in the areas of suicide, PTSD, blast injuries, brain injuries, amputations and burn injuries. Odom presented her research team’s findings in a report titled Behavioral Health Management Following a Severe Burn Injury: A Pilot Study and the Way Forward for the US Army Burn Center and Indicators for Brief PTSD Management in Operation.
Hermann Pereira, MSEd ’14, joined Prosper Waco as a senior content specialist, working with community and school leaders on Prosper Waco’s education efforts. Pereira has been an educator for 14 years, serving the last four years as principal of Connally [TX] ISD’s Career Tech Pathways in Technology Early College High School.
Emily Hunt-Hinojosa, MA ’15, PhD ’18, was named director of research and community impact for Prosper Waco. She develops and expands a framework for assessing progress toward community goals and benchmark progress in the areas of education, health and financial security. Hunt-Hinojosa previously worked with McLennan [TX] County. She was a research analyst at Baylor’s Center for Community Research and Development during her PhD program, and she conducted a variety of research projects for Waco organizations. Prosper Waco is a collective impact initiative focused on addressing issues facing the Greater Waco community in the areas of education, health and financial security.
Former Baylor men’s basketball student-athlete Pierre Jackson, ’15, was inducted into the College of Southern Idaho (CSI) Athletics Hall of Fame. Jackson led CSI to the NJCAA national championship in 2011. He currently plays for the NBA G-League’s South Bay Lakers.
David C. Miller, BA ’15, joined the litigation practice group in the Dallas office of Bradley Arant Boult Cummings LLP. He received his Juris Doctor from the University of Iowa College of Law, where he served as the senior articles editor for the Iowa Law Review. Miller clerked for Judge Ed Kinkeade, BA ’74, JD ’74, of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, Dallas Division. He attended the Baylor Law School Academy of the Advocate in St. Andrews, Scotland.
Former Baylor men’s basketball student-athlete Royce O’Neale, BSEd ’15, signed a four-year, $36 million contract extension with the National Basketball Association’s Utah Jazz in January. O’Neale is a regular starter for the Jazz and is among the NBA’s top 3-point shooters.
Mary Andrews Clark, BA ’16, is the new student success coach at Sampson Community College in Clinton, NC. She earned her graduate degree from Southern Methodist University and taught elementary school in Texas — through Teach for America — for three years before moving to North Carolina with her husband, who is stationed at Fort Bragg.
Lauren Kiefner, BA ’16, was named an associate attorney in Crowe & Dunlevy’s Oklahoma City office. She is a member of the firm’s appellate, banking and financial institutions and litigation and trial practice groups. A graduate of Washington University School of Law, Keifner earned a certificate in business law and was a senior editor for the Washington University Law Review.
Rachel Ticknor, BA ’16, and Nolan Bay, BA ’15, were married Jan. 5, 2019, at The Phoenix in Waco, followed by a trip to the Bahamas. Baylor wedding party participants included Courtney Holtkort Pruitt, Bri Cooper, Carly Zerr, Jesse Pyle, Kayla Farr Umberger, Chad May, Benton Miller, Brent Pollard, David Hornbeak, Greg Monn, Alex Aills and Taylor Dupre, along with many fellow Baylor friends and family. Nolan served as a team lead member of the Baylor Chamber Bear Program. He’s an admissions coordinator for Baylor, where Rachel is an MSEd candidate in higher education and student affairs and a graduate apprentice in the Department of Multicultural Affairs. Rachel is the granddaughter of Sam Houston Tubb Jr., BS ’61.
Evan Wild, BA ’16, joined the law firm of Barrett McNagny LLP in Fort Wayne, IN. He received his Juris Doctor from the University of Notre Dame Law School. He has been admitted to practice before the Indiana State Courts and the U.S. District Courts for the Northern and Southern Districts of Indiana.
Five months after Ty Drury, JD ’18, passed away from colon cancer, his parents James and Sheri Drury of Stephenville, TX, received for their son what Ty spent three years in law school to get: an honorary law license and bar card. At the Texas Supreme Court courtroom, Chief Justice Nathan L. Hecht, Justice Debra H. Lehrmann, the Court’s liaison to the State Bar, and State Bar Executive Director Trey Apffel III presented an honorary license and bar card to the Drurys. Ty’s Baylor classmates and fiancée McKenna Skidmore were present for the ceremony.
Porter Ellett, MSEd ’17, is senior assistant to the head coach for Andy Reid of the National Football League’s Kansas City Chiefs. KWTX-TV Waco featured Ellett as part of a Super Bowl-related story Jan. 28. The Chiefs defeated the San Francisco 49ers in Super Bowl LIV in February for Kansas City’s first title in 50 years.
Sarah Slover, BS ’18, and Morgun Brown were married June 1, 2019. They met working at Kanakuk Kamps. Sarah is a third-generation Baylor Bear, and her late grandfather Dr. J. David Slover, BA ’61, was the director of ministry guidance in the Baylor Department of Religion for 18 years. Her parents are Carol Glass Slover, BA ’89, and David M. Slover, BA ’86, MBA ’89, who currently serves on the Baylor Board of Regents. Sarah is the owner of a wedding photography business, sarahsloverphotography.com.
Zane Zovak, BA ’18, was named to the 2021 Class of Schwarzman Scholars, one of the world’s most prestigious graduate fellowships, at Schwarzman College at Tsinghua University in Beijing. The vision of Schwarzman Scholars is to bring together the world’s best young minds to explore and understand the economic, political and cultural factors that have contributed to China’s increasing importance as a global power, so that throughout their careers, they can deepen understanding between China and rest of the world across many different professional fields. This year, Zovak is one of 145 Schwarzman Scholars who were selected from more than 4,700 applicants and include students from 41 countries and 108 universities. The Class of 2021 enrolls in August 2020.
Baylor Economics lecturer Wayne Hampton, BSEd ’77, and Jacob Kehoe, BBA ’19, partnered for their company Aerial Intelligence Reports (AIR), which specializes in drone technology affecting the roofing industry. Clayton Tynes, BBA ’19, is also involved in the project. AIR has $8 million invested into the software data plan. They were featured in the Oct. 23, 2019, issue of The Baylor Lariat.
Morgan Morello, BA ’19, joined Platinum Rule Advisors, a talent coaching and consulting business in Nashville, TN, as a marketing specialist. She previously was a marketing specialist for Restoration Gateway Ministries, and she worked in the operations communication sector of Cracker Barrel.
Stephen Ellis of Flower Mound, TX, established the Darlene Marie Legge Ellis Memorial Endowed Scholarship Fund in Nursing, in loving memory of his wife Darlene Ellis, MSN ’08.
Douglas Knight of Dallas established the Ina Faye and Herbert Dale Knight Endowed Scholarship Fund for Study Abroad, which supports students participating in study abroad programs.
Donnie and Cindy Marion of Bellaire, TX, established the Marion Family Hankamer School of Business Management Department Endowed Fund in Ethics & Leadership. This fund helps strengthen experiential learning programs that focus on ethics and leadership development and provide opportunities for practice and reflection. The Marions have three daughters: Mattie, BBA ’12, Annie and Grace, BA ’17.
The Mathias Family Endowed Fund was established by Matt and Deborah Mathias, along with their children Mason, BBA ’18, Alexa and Jenna (Class of 2021), of Austin. This fund is used for faculty or students to pursue international research, mission or ministerial work, and it supports the Human Flourishing, Leadership and Ethics Academic Initiative of Illuminate.
Lucille Windham of Oklahoma City created the Windham Family/George W. Truett Theological Seminary Endowed Scholarship Fund in Preaching. This scholarship provides support to Truett doctoral students from Oklahoma and Texas.