Staff and Board of Directors
Staff
Abbey Bisschop has had a heart for orphans from a very young age, which has been developed over the years through travel experiences in various countries, as well as the privilege of caring for two Ethiopian boys for a season. She enjoys her role at FHTH for the opportunity it provides her to cultivate relationships and raise awareness and support for one of the largest and least supported groups of orphans: those living with HIV. Abbey lives with her husband in Lynden, WA, where she stays home with their three children. abbey@fromhivtohome.org
Angela Dormish serves on the board of FHTH and calls herself just a normal person living with a huge burden. Her heart bleeds for those suffering from the social stigmas and medical concerns caused by HIV and AIDS. She has been in full time ministry for 10 years and has lived in Hungary and Spain and has traveled extensively. God has used her travels to open her eyes to needs of people around the globe. She is married to the love of her life, Marrty, and together they started Sharing Their Story, of which From HIV to Home is a partner. She is the mother of 4 children ages 7,6,5 and 4 (the 2 oldest homegrown and 2 youngest came home from Ethiopia). Angela graduated from Missouri State University and holds a Bachelor of Science in Elementary Education. She teaches Elementary Spanish, Music and Sign Language a couple of days a week, and home schools the rest of the time.
Brianna Heldt – Brianna and her husband brought their twin sons, Yosef and Biniam, home from Ethiopia in 2006, and it was a trip that changed her life. After spending time in Addis Ababa at an orphanage caring for HIV+ orphans, Brianna became convicted that this was a story that desperately needed to be told. She became passionate not only about orphan care, but especially about the many children affected by HIV and living in developing countries. She has previously volunteered with an organization that cares for HIV-affected children in Africa and has a background in Psychology. Brianna lives with her husband and five children in Denver, Colorado. brianna@fromhivtohome.org
Jennifer Isaac – After adopting their daughter, Jaso, from Liberia in 2006 with medical needs, Jennifer and her family began to see the intense need for families willing to move forward with the adoption of children living with HIV. Spending time with HIV+ children during their son’s adoption in Ethiopia began to stir a passion for seeing these children find hope, health, and love – both through adoption and through in-country community-based care. And so From HIV to Home was birthed in early 2008. Jennifer has extensive administrative and non-profit experience, together with a deep desire to make connections between the world’s most vulnerable and the world’s most resourced. jennifer@fromhivtohome.org
Lisa Qualls – Lisa’s journey to adoption began on Valentine’s Day 2006 when a dear friend introduced her to the AIDS orphan crisis. Soon after, Lisa and her husband, Russ, began sponsoring an HIV+ orphan in Ethiopia and then began the process to adopt two little boys. In the midst of that adoption, Russ and Lisa learned that it was possible to adopt the little girl they had been sponsoring. Knowing very little about HIV/AIDS, they journeyed from uncertainty and relative ignorance to confidence and passion about adding her to their family. They traveled to Ethiopia in February 2007 to meet their new children. Their lives were forever changed when they walked through the gate of their daughter’s orphanage. Although unaware of it at the time, they met two of their daughters that day. Russ and Lisa returned to Ethiopia in August 2008 to bring home their second HIV+ daughter. Lisa has been married for 26 years to her husband, Russ. They have eleven children, four of whom were adopted from Ethiopia. Lisa writes the blog A Bushel and A Peck and is a regular contributor to Empowered to Connect. lisa@fromhivtohome.org
Board of Directors
Emily Barr serves on the board of FHTH as Secretary and is a Pediatric Nurse Practitioner and Certified Nurse Midwife in the Children’s Hospital Immunodeficiency Progam in Denver, Colorado, where she cares for HIV+ pregnant women, adolescents and children. She is involved in the International Maternal Pediatric Adolescent AIDS Clinical Trials program where she follows patients on large multi-center clinical trials both domestically and internationally. In her role, she has traveled to Romania, South Africa, Botswana, Uganda, and Zambia. She studied at Cornell University, Yale University and SUNY Stony Brook. Before coming to Denver, she worked in the Pediatric HIV Clinic at Yale University and at the Pediatric HIV and Immunology Clinic at the SUNY Health Sciences Center in Syracuse, New York. She has five children, including two adopted from Ethiopia in 2005.
Kim Chriscaden serves on the board of FHTH and received her M.A., International and Intercultural Communication and Global Health Affairs from the University of Denver. In the summer of 2006, Kim interned at Project Concern International in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia to assist the organization’s orphans and vulnerable children project with public relations and proposal writing. While in Ethiopia she saw first hand the need for HIV+ children to find loving families and homes and would often sit at the Hilton Hotel watching adopted children interact with their parents for the first time. Kim has extensive experience volunteering and working in developing countries as a program development specialist. She is passionate about alleviating the health needs of poor children around the world.
Bruce Johnson serves on the board of FHTH as Treasurer and is a State Farm Insurance agent in Englewood, Colorado. He has been associated with State Farm for 29 years, 13 in agency management and 16 as an agency owner. Bruce has qualified for President’s Club, Million Dollar Round Table and various industry awards. Bruce, a graduate of Wheaton College (Illinois), and his wife, Linda, have two adult married children who have lived abroad for extended periods. Their daughter, Betsy, has ministered in East Africa on three separate occasions, most recently in Ethiopia. Todd, their elder child, lived in Honduras and Mexico for three and a half years. Through their experiences, Bruce has developed a heart for children in the Third World, financially supporting numerous kids and their families. Bruce humbly hopes that he can contribute general business and financial expertise to further the success of FHTH.
Ross M. Kedl serves as the President of the board of FHTH. As a research immunologist, as well as the adoptive father of a daughter from China, Ross has both a professional and personal interest in advocating for orphans infected with HIV. Ross received his Ph.D. from the Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathology at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis. Following a post-doctoral fellowship in a Howard Hughes Medical Institute laboratory, he went to industry, joining 3M Pharmaceuticals working in their small molecule immune response modifier program. There he spearheaded efforts at developing novel vaccine adjuvants, resulting in a variety of publications and patents in the area of vaccine technology. In 2004, Ross returned to the academic sector by joining the faculty in the Integrated Department of Immunology at the University of Colorado Health Science Center and the National Jewish Medical and Research Center where he continues to pursue the development of vaccine technology. He is also the founder of a start-up pharmaceutical company, ImmuRx Inc., which focuses on developing therapeutic vaccines against chronic infectious diseases, such as HIV and cancer.
