Behind The Mission

About Today’s Guests Dr. Tina Atherall brings her vast experience and leadership in the military non-profit community and academia to PsychArmor. In 2006, she co-founded Hope For The Warriors, an organization dedicated to serving combat wounded servicemembers and their families. Scaling a grass-roots effort to a national platform, she worked extensively with various levels of military leadership,...

About Today’s Guest Dr. Becky Porter joined MCEC® as the President and CEO in 2019 following her retirement from active duty service with the U.S. Army. Becky is a 1983 Distinguished Military Graduate from the University of Washington and holds a Doctorate of Philosophy (Ph. D.) in clinical psychology from Fielding Graduate University. She earned her Master of Arts in counseling psychology from Ch...

About Today’s Guest Bill Braniff is an Army veteran and Director of the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START) and a Professor of the Practice at the University of Maryland. He previously served as the director of practitioner education at West Point’s Combating Terrorism Center and an instructor in the Department of Social Sciences, as a foreign affairs...

About Today’s Guest Jen Wilson was born and raised in Louisiana, the product of a National Guard town and the proud granddaughter of a D-Day & Battle of the Bulge survivor.  Like many Americans, Jen's worldview shifted dramatically after September 11, 2001.  While sitting in her dorm room at LSU on that fateful day, even though she'd never been to New York and knew no one there, she made the d...

About Today’s Guest Thomas Brennan is the Founder of and Executive Director for The War Horse. Prior to studying journalism at Columbia University, he was a sergeant in the Marine Corps and served as an infantryman in Iraq and Afghanistan. Thomas is the co-author of Shooting Ghosts—A U.S. Marine, a Combat Photographer, and Their Journey Back from War. His bylines have appeared in Vanity Fair, Cent...

About Today’s Guest Charles Tawiah is a United States Navy Veteran. He served from 2013-2017 as an Aviation Boatswain's Mate Crash and Salvage Firefighter on the USS Harry S. Truman (CVN75). Charles was deployed twice with the Harry S. Truman to the Mediterranean Arabian Gulf; Operation Enduring Freedom (JUL2013-APR2014) and Operation Inherent Resolve (NOV2015-JUL2016). Charles comes from a milita...

About Today’s Guest Beth Conlin is the Senior Program Manager of Military Spouse Programs at Amazon. An Army spouse, Beth has been working to improve employment opportunities for military spouses since an overseas move in 2013 forced her to quit her job, putting both her professional development and family stability at risk. Initially, Beth started working on the unemployment crisis for military s...

About Today’s Guest Michele Spires is ACE’s acting executive director for Learning Evaluations, the national leader in recognizing and validating learning and competencies to connect students, workforce, training providers, and universities.  In this role, she provides leadership to innovate new and transformational opportunities for ACE and its membership.   With more than 25 years of wide-rangin...

About Today’s Guest Stephanie is a Population Health Strategy Lead for Humana’s Veteran Bold Goal, a population health strategy focused on both community and business integration to improve the clinical and social health outcomes of veterans and their families. Her career developed out of her passion to serve and invest in the military communities she has lived in for 20+ years as a military spous...

About Today’s Guest Chris Spencer – Director of Operations, Oracle Corporation, is a passionate servant leader focused on bringing people together to help develop people solutions that keep things moving. With 30 years of experience building and leading teams, Chris is driven to think critically about process efficiencies and how what we do affects the way we should be doing it. Chris’ current rol...

About Today’s Guest Jonathan Crandall served eight years in the United States Marine Corps. Crandall served as a Team Leader for the Scout/Sniper Platoon of Third Battalion, Sixth Marines (3/6). Following his time with 3/6, Crandall was assigned to the 4th Marine Expeditionary Brigade (MEB) training unit as their Chief Instructor for the Designated Marksman Course. After his 4th MEB assignment, Cr...

About Today’s Guest Zack Baddorf is the executive director and founder of the non-profit organization Military Veterans in Journalism. Baddorf is a national security and foreign policy professional with more than 15 years experience on the frontlines of the world’s conflicts, including Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Central African Republic, Crimea, Kashmir and the West Bank. Baddorf works fo...

About Today’s Guest Ms. Christensen is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker who has spent her career supporting families in healthcare settings. Ms. Christensen began her career in pediatric oncology and palliative care, at Oregon Health & Sciences University and then at Stanford Children’s Health. Her career with the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) began when the Caregiver Support Program (C...

About Today’s Guests Dr. Matthew A. Miller, PhD, MPH, is the National Director, Suicide Prevention Program, Office of Mental Health and Suicide Prevention U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. He leads a team dedicated to the implementation and reinforcement of evidence-based community and clinical interventions addressing suicide prevention. Previously, he served as the Director of the Veterans Cr...

About Today’s Guests Nick Howland is CEO of The Fire Watch, Florida’s fight to end veteran suicide. Nick is a Navy veteran, defense industry executive, husband and father of two boys. After serving 4 years as a Naval Officer, Nick spent the next 20 years leading U.S. defense manufacturing businesses focused on protective products for soldiers, airmen and sailors, including body armor, life rafts a...

About Today’s Guests Dr. Joseph Geraci, PhD, retired from the U.S. Army as an Infantry Lieutenant Colonel after serving for 20 years and deploying as a combat leader with elite Special Operations/Ranger, Airborne, and Infantry units to Afghanistan four different times since 9/11. While in uniform, he also served as an assistant professor at the U.S. Military Academy in both the Department of Behav...

About Today’s Guests Tina Atherall, DSW, LMSW , brings to PsychArmor her vast experience and leadership in the military non-profit community and academia. In 2006, she co-founded Hope For The Warriors, an organization dedicated to serving combat wounded servicemembers and their families. Scaling a grass-roots effort to a national platform, she worked extensively with various levels of military lea...

About Today’s Guests Melissa Comeau is a Marine Corps spouse, director of the American Red Cross’ Military Veteran Caregiver Network, and a writer. She is known for her book “Sleeping with the War,” published in 2015 by the War Writers’ Campaign. The book offers a family and caregiver perspective on life after combat.   She served as an Arizona Fellow for the Elizabeth Dole Foundation and in that...

About Today’s Guests JAKE DUKES: Jake joined the Camp Southern Ground team in March of 2018. He is a leadership coach, speaker and author who served for many years on executive teams of large churches focused on developing staff and overseeing campus operations. Now he uses his unique blend of business and ministry experience to develop future strategy for Camp Southern Ground and help facilitate...

About Today’s Guests Mary Beth Bruggeman spent 8 years as an active duty Marine combat engineer.  After leaving active duty, Mary Beth worked for iRobot Corporation for 4 years, advancing their work on counter-IED robotics, spent time as a stay at home mom and Marine wife, and then started and grew a fitness and nutrition coaching business.  Mary Beth joined the Mission Continues team in 2015 as t...

About Today’s Guests Becky Scheusner is a multi-faceted professional leading with an altruistic mission to do the most good for the most people.  Primarily Becky works in Business Development for WWC Global - a small, Women-owned government contracting firm based in Tampa that specializes in providing practical, innovative, and budget-conscious business solutions to the government.  Becky has also...

About Today’s Guest A vocal advocate for the public support of our military community, Mr. Teravainen assumed his position as President and CEO in February 2014 after serving as a board chairman, director and volunteer since 2009. ​In this role, Tony oversees the positioning of STEP as a successful, trusted and viable partner to Southern California and Washington State’s military population. Under...

About Today’s Guest Rocio Galarza serves as the Vice President in the U.S. Social Impact department at Sesame Workshop. In this role, she manages the development of educational content and research for a wide range of multimedia projects. As an expert in early childhood educational development and the needs of young children, she works with advisors to ensure that the content of Sesame Street’s ou...

About Today’s Guest Michael McDowell currently serves as the President/CEO for Valor Club USA developing a comprehensive living and learning community built to support the unique needs of transitioning service members around the country. McDowell served as the Executive Director of The Soldiers Project, a national organization offering free, confidential, and unlimited mental and behavioral health...

About Today’s Guest Mark Casper is the President and Executive Director of Tech For Troops (T4T) a non partisan, non profit based in Richmond, VA.  Tech For Troops Mission is dedicated to empowering Veterans with computers, skills, and Information Technology (IT) work force training.  While located in Richmond, Tech For Troops has National reach.     He believes that working computers can provide...