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In January of 2009, I was horrified by the number of veterans that had committed suicide after returning to the states.  The American Public Health Association stated, “Suicide remains a serious and expanding public health issue. Recent studies have shown that veterans are twice as likely as non-veterans to complete suicide and more active-duty soldiers are now taking their own lives than are being killed in combat in Iraq and Afghanistan. The latest Army report reveals that in one month, January 2009, the number of suicides by deployed soldiers was …six times as many as those [who killed] themselves in January 2008, the year in which the suicide rate surpassed all previous years.”

At the start of the year, I thought about what I could do to help the returning veterans with their transition back to the US.  I had a job where I was providing quality assurance to the educational programs for juvenile offenders; a large aspect of that job dealt with transitioning the juveniles successfully back into the community.  In fact, one of the quality assurance standards was titled, Community Reintegration.  I provided resources and training to the juvenile programs to improve the reentry back to school, work or college.  As I researched resources, I came across a similarity between the juvenile offenders’ transition goals and those of the returning veterans; they both set transitional goal.

At this point, I realized that I could use my knowledge of transitional goal setting and community reintegration to aid the returning veterans.  I discovered several reliable, free resources, as part of my job, so I decided to share these with the veterans and the general public to help out during this economic downturn.  My heart goes out to all of the soldiers, especially the wounded.  Therefore, I started writing a business plan to build our nonprofit, filed for our 501(c)3 status, and created a Web site: [2] www.brokebutnotforlong.org.  I wanted to add the interactive communication of a blog to help veterans and displaced workers have a voice.   I just posted our Web site today, Veteran’s Day!  It’s a work in progress that I hope to build into a useful employment social network.

Your blogger,

Sandra Annette Rogers