My entire life, my mentors have told me to focus, to do one thing, and to do it well – and to forgo the sometimes erratic, often wandering, and never linear life I have lived.

At an older age, I can finally see the wisdom in the advice, though I’m not sure it could have been deployed any earlier my development.

I have never liked talking about past achievements and have spent a lifetime abandoning disciplines and careers when I felt I had done enough, learned enough, or given enough.

But here is glimpse into what I was, what I did, and the almost assured mental instability that this grew out of, and nurtured.

Personal and Professional Summary

I spent the first part of my life in a trailer park in Southwest Missouri, attended public schools, and went on to earn a B.A. in Sociology/Philosophy, an M.A. in Sociology, an M.A. in Clinical Psychology, an MBA, and a Ph.D. in Sociology. My doctoral dissertation studied serial killers and the country’s largest death rows.

My early professional work included clinical and social service roles with foster children, families, residential treatment clients, LGBTQ adults and couples, children exposed to domestic violence, and teens in crisis. I went on to serve as an agency social worker and later social work supervisor for a foster agency serving the children of South Central Los Angeles.

I eventually left that work after one of my foster children was murdered. The children that witnessed it called me screaming through the phone and I beat the ambulance to the hospital where her body was identified and her family was told she would never be coming home. I became a professor, trying to share what I thought I knew.

I was fortunate to serve as president of three colleges and later joined the senior leadership team at the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities at a time when the agency was deeply focused on serving institutions and the millions of students they supported. I was then elected President of the Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges, where I have the privilege of helping advance the promise of American higher education.

I have also been fortunate enough to serve in national and sector leadership roles, including Chair of the Council of Recognized Accrediting Commissions, a member of the Council for Higher Education Accreditation’s Committee on Recognition, past chair of the ACE Commission on Education Attainment and Innovation, past commissioner for the Western Association of Schools and Colleges, past chair of the Council of Applied Master’s Programs in Psychology, and past editor-in-chief of the Journal of Performance Psychology.

I remain a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist and a Master Professional with the Professional Golfers Association of America.

My work in performance psychology includes founding and leading the Center for Performance Psychology, writing and speaking on sport psychology, coaching, performance, habits, and human potential.

My published work includes books on marriage and family therapy and sports psychology; book chapters on online education and higher education fundraising; and academic articles on accreditation, criminal justice, performance, coaching, and psychotherapy.

My most recent academic work is part of the American Council on Education’s leadership series entitled The Good, The Bad, The Board with the American Council on Education, drawing from my work as an accreditor and higher education leader to examine governance challenges and cautionary tales in higher education.

I have also has also written six books of fiction drawing from my background in clinical psychology and my work with serial killers. A manuscript I wrote about my time taking the last confession of Luis Gravito was optioned for television.

Less known is that I survived two serious cancer scares, experiences that I am always struggling to integrate into my personal and professional experiences.

My writing is intended to help people and institutions tell the truth about who they are, what they have survived, and what they are willing to become.