Posts Tagged Lisa Daniel
Sailor Transitions to Sonar After Navy
Posted by carol.bowers in Family Matters on August 23, 2012
By Lisa Daniel
When First Lady Michelle Obama and her “Joining Forces“ partners talk about service members needing transitioning into commercial work, they’re talking about people like Paul Michael Andrews.
First Lady Michelle Obama announces a major military employment milestone during a “Joining Forces” event on Naval Station Mayport in Jacksonville, Fla., Aug. 22, 2012, reporting that more than 2,000 companies have hired 125,000 veterans and spouses through the campaign. U.S. Navy photo by Petty Officer 1st Class Ian W. Anderson
Andrews joined the military young and without a college degree. The Navy sent him to school to be a sonar technician, and he spent most of his six-year military career operating the world’s most sophisticated equipment to detect and track foreign submarines from the USS Roosevelt guided missile destroyer.
Andrews had two deployments: one to Somalia, and another to eastern Afghanistan to serve nine months working intelligence for a provincial reconstruction team.
The former petty officer knew he’d had “some awesome experiences” in the Navy, but when he decided to separate, he said, the thought of a civilian job search was filled with anxiety. Like many of his shipmates, he had never written a resume and didn’t know where to begin.
“We don’t spend time tweaking our resumes and building our professional networks,” he said. “Our network consists of the men and women we serve next to. Read the rest of this entry »
Job Fairs Join Spouses, Employers
Posted by carol.bowers in Family Matters on August 1, 2012
By Lisa Daniel
Tomorrow marks the start of an open season of sorts for job fairs for military spouses in what one Pentagon official calls the “high-touch” part of a “high-tech, high-touch” process.
Meg O’Grady was a military spouse herself, having moved 13 times in 17 years, when she began working at the Pentagon just before the June 29, 2011, launch of the Defense Department’s Military Spouse Employment Partnership. Read more. Today, she is its acting program manager.
The partnership hosts an online job portal where military spouses can search for jobs, post resumes and receive education and training, and where employers can post openings and search for new talent. The site has posted more than 500,ooo job ads in the past year, and has 220,000 ads on any given day, O’Grady said. That’s the high-tech part.
The high-touch part gets under way tomorrow as MSEP’s partner, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Hiring Our Heroes program, ramps up its “touch” tactics by sponsoring numerous job fairs in the coming weeks in military-populated cities such as Hampton, Va.; Minneapolis; Utica, N.Y.; Sugar Grove, Ill.; Lake Charles, La.; and Quantico, Va., to name a few. Click for the full list. The DOD and Chamber programs compliment that of Joining Forces, a program started by First Lady Michelle Obama and Second Lady Jill Biden that also works to improve military spouses employment.
The job fairs not only bring employers to job seekers, but also offer forums for helping spouses with resume writing, networking and the like, Laura Dempsey, director of Hiring Our Heroes, told me. Dempsey, too, is a military spouse, and so knew the potential of those who mostly have been an untapped resource in hiring. Read the rest of this entry »
Joining Forces Exceeds Expectations, Director Says
Posted by carol.bowers in Family Matters on July 27, 2012
By Lisa Daniel
When First Lady Michelle Obama and Dr. Jill Biden, wife of Vice President Joe Biden started the “Joining Forces” campaign 15 months ago, they did so with the goal of creating impactful and lasting health, education and employment support for military families.
The campaign had two significant achievements this week that its director, Navy Capt. Brad Cooper, told me hit both of those marks.
First, North Carolina became the 26th state to pass a law making it easier for military spouses to transfer their professional licenses. (Read more.) South Carolina and Hawaii passed similar laws in recent weeks, potentially affecting tens of thousands of military spouses, Cooper said. With similar legislation pending in California, Ohio and New Jersey, the campaign is “exceeding our expectations” in getting laws passed in all 50 states by the end of 2014, he said.
“As I take step back and look this – and my dad was an Army officer – this signals a pretty remarkable cultural shift,” Cooper said. “I remember my mother — as well as my wife, spouses of my friends — were reluctant even to indicate they were military spouses” to prospective employers, he said.
Second, the National Association of Social Workers, at its annual convention here this week, announced it is launching a free, online training course for all social workers to better understand the unique needs of military families. It also is providing a set of standards for working with veterans and military families, and is creating a professional Credential for Social Work with Veterans and Military Families. (Read more.)
Social workers are considered the nation’s frontline mental health services providers, and they practice in every county in the country. The NASW represents 650,000 of them. Its pledge to Joining Forces follows that of the four largest nursing associations, representing 3 million nurses, and the Association of American Medical Colleges and the American Association of Colleges of Osteopathic Medicine, with 105 and 25 schools, respectively, in training doctors to serve military families and veterans. The Association of Marriage and Therapy Therapists also has signed on, as well as associations representing psychiatrists, psychologists and surgeons.
“This really represents, to me, not just the impactful piece, but the sustaining piece,” Cooper said.
Spouses’ and veterans’ employment also has made major strides, Cooper said. More than 2,000 companies have signed on already hiring 25,000 spouses and 65,000 veterans, and pledging to hire another 175,000 in the next two years, helping bring down the veterans’ unemployment rate, he said.
“This really is the largest outreach and advocacy efforts we’ve had on behalf of veterans and their families for years,” Cooper said.
Joining Forces has been successful, he said, because “we’ve been able to breach through years and years of bureaucracy and bring people together and focus them on the effort.” All they needed was leadership and direction, he added.
“People, generally, want to be helpful,” Cooper said. “They don’t always know what they can do. Our objective is to steer them to meaningful action.”
Joining Forces’ efforts have caught the attention of military spouses.
Network Helps Spouses Remain Lawyers
Posted by carol.bowers in Family Matters on June 27, 2012
By Lisa Daniel
Lori Volkman was in college when she confronted what some would approach as an either-or situation: marry the Navy pilot she’d fallen in love with, or head for law school for the career she was passionate about.
Volkman had grown up in a Navy family and she knew she couldn’t have it both ways – at least not at the same time. “I knew exactly what was involved in that,” she told me when we spoke on Monday.
Not only would frequent relocations prevent her from practicing law, “I didn’t even know if we’d be anywhere long enough for me to finish law school,” she said. “I knew as Navy brat that there was a very real possibility of having only two-year duty stations.”
So Volkman and her husband came to an agreement: he would leave active duty for the Navy reserves, and she would go to law school.
Volkman, the deputy prosecuting attorney for Clark County in Washington state, says she is both fortunate and atypical of military spouse lawyers. “I’m one of the few who have enjoyed working in the same place for 12 years,” she said.
Just over a year ago, Volkman signed on to helping other military spouses pursue their careers in law after Erin Wirth, a federal administrative law judge and Coast Guard wife, asked her to join her and Mary Reding, another military spouse attorney, in starting The Military Spouse JD Network. Wirth had moved seven times in 15 years, and sometimes did not relocate with her husband, to maintain her law career even when it meant taking jobs below her experience level, Volkman said. Read the rest of this entry »
DOD Schools Mark Successes
Posted by carol.bowers in Family Matters on June 20, 2012
By Lisa Daniel
Department of Defense Education Activity’s schools have been on a roll lately with high achievement of both teachers and students. Now that the 2011-12 school year is behind them, students, teachers and parents have much to be proud of.
The latest recognition goes to math teacher Spencer Bean at Baumholder Middle-High School, Germany, who has been chosen to receive the 2011 Presidential Award for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching here June 27. Read more here.
Bean is the kind of teacher parents hope their children will have in school: high-energy, innovative and focused on individual student success. The motivating force for Bean is that he loves his work.
In his 13 years of teaching, he said, “I’ve rarely ever missed a day of work; I just love it that much.”
Like many high-achieving students, Bean said, he had to be talked into teaching. He was a math major and, already married in college, wanted to earn a good living. He considered going into accounting or some other business area.
Bean had the good fortune of having a mentor who advised him to go into something he was passionate about, and a brother – an Air Force officer based in Germany – who told him that, for teachers, DODEA’s pay, benefits and opportunities for travel are hard to beat.
“With public schools, … it’s a tough thing to do to say you’re going to be a teacher,” Bean said. “You have to be really motivated. DODEA can definitely have the best and brightest because of what they offer financially.”
Defense Department schools have demonstrated success in many ways lately. In April, Angela Wilson, a 7th grade language arts teacher at Vicenza Middle School, Italy, represented DOD schools as one of four finalists in the annual National Teacher of the Year competition here.
In May, Anuk Dayaprema, a seventh-grade student at Vincenza Middle School, represented DOD and State Department schools at the Scripps National Spelling Bee, and Dominik Muellerleile, an eighth-grade student at Wiesbaden Middle School, Germany, represented DOD and State Department schools in the 24th annual National Geographic Bee here.
In June, DODEA celebrated its first graduation – of three students – of its Virtual School, a high school that serves students through technology to get required courses they otherwise wouldn’t be able to take. And, DODEA offered live streaming of its graduations where many parents are deployed.
There are many reasons to celebrate Defense Department schools. Bean is just the latest example of a school system that does so many things right.
“I’ve never regretted it,” Bean said of his decision to become a Defense Department teacher. “I’ve loved it ever since.”
Family Matters Blog: Grants Help Kids Stay Active
Posted by carol.bowers in Family Matters on May 24, 2012
By Lisa Daniel
May 24, 2012
When Decorda Owens’ father deployed to Afghanistan last year with the Mississippi Army National Guard, the 13-year-old stepped up to take care of the family yard work and help his mother with his three younger sisters.
Like so many children of Guard and Reserve members, Decorda didn’t have the support of a military base where he lives in Starkville, Miss., yet he’d assumed a lot of stress and responsibility. The shining light for Decorda was a grant from the Our Military Kids nonprofit group to pursue his passion for hip-hop dancing.
As summer approaches and families search for camps, activities and possibly tutors to get the kids through those long three months, they should know about Our Military Kids. The organization, which began in 2004, awarded 9,150 grants worth $3.75 million last year. The grants are reserved for children of deployed National Guard and Reserve members, as well as children of service members severely wounded in Afghanistan or Iraq, whether they are active, Guard, Reserve, or retired. Families may receive up to $500 per child.
Decorda and four other children of National Guard and Reserve members traveled to Washington for an April 19 event to showcase how they’ve used Our Military Kids grants while their parent was deployed. The children, all honored as Our Military Kids of the Year for their high achievement, danced and performed various musical instruments before a packed auditorium at the Naval Heritage Center as proof of the nonprofit’s good investment.
The organization even appealed to top Navy leadership to cut short the deployment of Petty Officer Christopher Karnbach, a Navy reservist deployed to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, a couple weeks early so he could surprise his family and join them on stage as Our Military Kids’ Military Family of the Year. They agreed, and Karnbach had an emotional reunion with his wife, Anne Marie; son, Christopher, and daughter, Abigail, both of whom demonstrated that they’ve learned to break boards with tae kwon do kicks from lessons provided by the grants.
“It’s been a great opportunity for my children and I’m sure for everybody else’s to give them something to think about besides having a deployed parent,” Karnbach said of the grant money the couple’s two children received to take tae kwon do lessons.
The military’s top leaders frequently tout the importance of public-private partnerships to support military families and Our Military Kids, supported by public and corporate money, is a good example.