Joe Khalil
Founder & Executive Director
Joseph Adib Khalil, DDS, is the founder of Arlington Dentistry for Design and Oakton Dentistry for Design in northern Virginia. He graduated with honors and multiple awards from the Medical College of Virginia School of Dentistry at Virginia Commonwealth University in 2000 and later completed his prosthodontic specialty residency at the University of Iowa. Dr. Khalil has been involved with serving others through volunteer and non-profit work since his early teens in Lebanon, as a boy scout and Red Cross volunteer. In dental school, Dr. Khalil volunteered for the Jamaica Project to bring free dental care to children who needed it most. While pursuing his career, Dr. Khalil never forgot his passion for wanting to give back to his home country of Lebanon.
In 2018, Dr. Khalil founded the American Lebanese Political Action Committee (ALPAC) to help bring Lebanon to the center of U.S. policy decisions in the Middle East and ultimately support a brighter future for the country and its citizens: men, women, and children. Empower Lebanon is Dr. Khalil's latest effort to give back to his home country.
Board of Directors
Zack Bazzi
President
As the Middle East Regional Director for Spirit of America, Zack Bazzi has overseen nearly 200 security, governance, and humanitarian assistance projects in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, and Central Asia. Zack's work focuses on supporting the efforts of U.S. diplomats, troops, and their local allies and partners. Before joining Spirit of America, co-founded TentED, an NGO dedicated to advancing education for children displaced by war. Prior to that, Zack managed special projects in Afghanistan for an airlift company supporting U.S. military operations, consulted overseas, and served in leadership roles at organizations assisting American veterans.
Zack served in the U.S. Army and Army National Guard as an infantryman, completing four overseas deployments to Bosnia, Kosovo, Iraq, and Afghanistan. He is a 2017 Marshall Memorial Fellow and has earned several recognitions for his international work, including the Daily Points of Light Award, Got your Six Storyteller, and a HillVets 100 selectee. Zack earned a Bachelor's degree in Psychology from the University of New Hampshire and a Master's degree in Emergency and Disaster Management from Georgetown University.
Joelle Jackson
Vice President
Joelle Jackson is a Conscious Leadership Coach with 20 years of experience in helping global citizens overcome the status quo. Her desire to see more individuals unleash their potential and become "the change they want to see in the world" compelled her in 2013 to become a professional coach. Joelle’s niche, conscious leadership, entails leading thoughts, emotions, and actions consciously, and moving out of default modes of thinking, feeling, and acting that keep us stuck in the status quo. She works with clients in various industries, including technology, healthcare, construction, consulting, and government. Her clients include C-suite executives, emerging leaders, women leaders, entrepreneurs, new parents, and members of traditionally marginalized groups.
She received a master’s degree in international affairs from George Washington University and worked for the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs. As a Lebanese-American, Joelle speaks Arabic at a native level and is passionate about everything Lebanon!
Aline VornDick
Secretary
Aline K. VornDick is a Washington, D.C.-based communication, media, and international relations expert, currently with Avisa-Partners, North America. She consulted for both Duco Advisors and for Approach Research Center where she worked closely with renowned think-tank experts and influential figures on crucial Middle East-related issues. In addition, she served in the Middle East Policy Office (International Security Affairs) at the U.S. Department of Defense under both Secretary Leon Panetta and Secretary Chuck Hagel.
She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Communication Arts (2001) and Master of Business Administration (2007) from the Lebanese American University in Beirut, Lebanon and is a native speaker of Arabic and French. She also graduated with a Master in Liberal Arts focused on International Relations from Harvard University (Extension School Program), and was selected as Commencement Speaker for her class in 2015. She is married to U.S. Navy Commander Wilson T. VornDick, and they reside with their children in the Washington, D.C. area.
Zach Brooks-Miller
Treasurer
Zach Brooks-Miller is a Humanitarian Aid/Disaster Response professional with over 13 years of experience designing, implementing, monitoring, evaluating, and leading collaborative lifesaving projects in disaster, conflict, and post-conflict environments with civil society and military partners. Currently serving as the Director of Field Operations with Team Rubicon, he coordinates information and resources for all Domestic and International Disaster Response and Disaster Risk Reduction Operations.
Prior to his work with Team Rubicon, Zach worked in the humanitarian mine action, clearing explosive remnants of war with The HALO Trust in Somaliland, Nagorno-Karabakh, Mozambique, Sri Lanka, and Laos. Zach is an Army veteran who served two tours in Iraq as a Combat Engineer and holds a B.A. in History and a Masters in International Affairs.