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  • Frontline Healing Foundation: Treating our Veterans and First Responders this Veterans Day

    Ahead of Veterans Day this year, Philanthropy Roundtable sat down with Jordyn Jureczki, CEO of Frontline Healing Foundation (FHF), an organization answering the call to treat veterans and first responders who struggle with substance abuse and suicidal thoughts as a result of service-induced trauma and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). As a primary funder for those seeking help through the Warriors Heart Treatment Center and similar treatment centers, FHF helps “Warriors,” who may not have insurance, access world-class medical care and participate in hands-on rehabilitation strategies. Instead of a one-size-fits-all rehabilitation approach, FHF provides Warriors with a loving and supportive atmosphere, the tools to become self-sufficient and meaningful lasting relationships with those who have also been in the fight. 

    The interview below has been edited for length and clarity.  


    Q: What is the mission, history and focus of Frontline Healing Foundation? 

    Jureczki: FHF, formerly the Warriors Heart Foundation, was founded in 2015 out of necessity to subsidize the funding of treatment for chemical dependency in the Warrior class (those who are active-duty military, veterans or first responders). The foundation works closely with the founders of the Warriors Heart treatment center in Bandera, Texas, who created something truly unique. Tom Spooner, who is a retired U.S. Army Delta Force operator and has been in the recovery community for over 30 years, combined forces with Josh and Lisa Lannon, a power couple who had built and operated drug and alcohol treatment centers across the country. Josh has also been in recovery for over 20 years and Lisa is a former law enforcement officer (LEO). Together, they built a program offering treatment that works in confronting a mental health crisis among veterans and service members.   

    When we look at the staggering statistics, primarily the suicide rate statistics among the veteran population, what is a variable that we can single-handedly attack? Substance abuse. When service members commit that final act, they are often under the influence. The founders of Warriors Heart determined that if we could treat the chemical dependency, we also could get to the underlying PTSD and traumatic brain injury (TBI) that may be at the root of the substance use.  

    The primary obstacle to providing world class treatment is funding. And thus, the foundation was born. In 2023 we changed our name to the Frontline Healing Foundation to reduce confusion regarding the separation between Warriors Heart, which is a private entity and treatment facility, and the foundation, which is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit.  

    The foundation funds individuals who do not have the means to fund their treatment. Some of the treatments we fund are inpatient treatment, intensive outpatient treatment, sober living, K9’s and MeRT brain treatment.  


    Q. How did you get involved with Frontline Healing Foundation and why does this mission mean so much to you? 

    Jureczki: I am a U.S. Navy veteran and a Texas LEO. In 2019, I was involved in a relationship with a man who was also a veteran and LEO. He suffered heavily from PTSD and we both drank heavily, as that was typical behavior in our community. He was extremely abusive, and one night I realized that if I didn’t leave, he was going to kill me. I ran out of the house in my pajamas, barefoot and my department was notified. The local mental health authority refused to see him, because he was under the influence of alcohol. Charges were filed, but ultimately dropped. I landed in a run-down apartment where I wallowed in my guilt and shame on a nightly basis and resorted to alcohol to cope with feelings of failure.  

     In 2020, I began training in jiu-jitsu and attended a local competition in San Antonio. This is where I met Josh Lannon, who introduced me to Warriors Heart. Although my involvement was initially few and far between, the Lannons began to immerse me in the Warriors Heart community and the personal development it offers. In 2021, I reached my breaking point and made the decision to take my life back and get sober. I haven’t had a drink since, and I owe the absolutely linear improvement of my life to Warriors Heart, without which, I would likely not be alive today. I was given the opportunity to become the CEO of the foundation at the beginning of this year, and I will continue to dedicate my life to giving the opportunity to heal that I was given to my fellow Warriors.   


    Q. Frontline Healing Foundation is a primary funder for warriors seeking rehabilitation at Warriors Heart addiction and PTSD treatment center. Can you tell us a little bit about that treatment facility or the others you work with? 

    Jureczki: Warriors Heart is truly one of a kind. The original facility is located in Bandera, Texas, on a 500-acre ranch which was formerly a corporate retreat for ConocoPhillips. When you enter the front gates at Warriors Heart, you are immediately overcome with a feeling of release and you know you are in a place of great healing. For those who have been to other drug and alcohol treatment centers, you will immediately note that this feels nothing like the cold, damp halls of a state-funded facility. The first stop is intake, where, instead of having your shoelaces quickly taken from you, you are told a phrase that will be repeated throughout your stay: “Welcome Home.”  

    The staff members at Warriors Heart all have some connection to the community, whether that be the Warrior community, the recovery community or both, – and it shows. The entire dual diagnosis-based program was written by the founders and former clinical director, Annette Hill, to operate as a training program, not a hospital. For Warriors, going to a 42-day inpatient training seems a lot more familiar than going to conventional rehab.  

    During their stay, Warriors have the opportunity to attend group counseling, one-on-one counseling, art class, wood and metal shop, bass fishing, hiking, fitness and jiu-jitsu classes. Upon completion of treatment, Warriors have the choice to attend an Intensive Outpatient Program, stay in a sober living community and receive MeRT Brain Treatment, or return home. If a Warrior chooses to return home, they can always return for a “recharge” or attend Warriors Anonymous meetings via Zoom. Warriors Heart recently opened its second facility in Milford, Virginia, where they plan to continue to pursue their mission of bringing one million Warriors home.  

    Q. Can you share any stories of warriors who have received funding for treatment through Frontline Healing Foundation, and how this treatment has changed their lives?  

    Jureczki: Due to the anonymous nature of recovery, it is not often we get to share the stories of the Warriors who cross our paths. However, there are some who choose to share their stories so they may inspire the next Warrior to seek the help they need. Robert and Kyle, who attended Warriors Heart in 2020, do this through a podcast they both host titled “The High Speed Chicken Feed Podcast.” Robert, a retired Louisiana law enforcement officer who was fully funded by the foundation for treatment, emphasizes how he was initially unable to find funding for treatment due to the scarce resources provided to members of law enforcement. Robert also shares his full story of recovery on the podcast, in his own words.  

    Kyle, a U.S. Army veteran, and Robert were able to fill in the gaps for each other during treatment, validating the emphasis that Warriors Heart puts on peer-to-peer support. Robert now works as an admissions advocate at Warriors Heart and Kyle continues to serve the Warrior community by living and breathing the lessons we are taught in recovery. 


    Q. What more do you think people need to know about supporting veterans through philanthropy? Any thoughts on why foundations like yours are so critical for this community? 

    Jureczki: I think it is very important to offer solutions to the problems in our community. When a veteran reaches out for help, whether that be through the VA, the suicide hotline or through friends and family, what’s the next step? Many treatment centers for PTSD and TBI will not accept individuals who are under the influence. The fact of the matter is, addicts are not typically invested in. 

    I cannot promise you that 100% of our Warriors will come out with no more problems. That’s just naive. Treatment is expensive and sobriety is a journey, it’s something you have to work for. What I can promise is that each Warrior we fund will be sent to a vetted facility that offers them the best environment for healing. They will be insulated by love, surrounded by their fellow Warriors and cared for by people who are committed to serving those who served us. 

    Last year, FHF funded 112 individuals through treatment in 2022 with an average cost of $9,555 per person. You can read more about who we serve and how we serve them in our impact reports. 


    Q. What is your vision for the future of Frontline Healing Foundation?  

    Jureczki: Our vision for FHF is to have the ability to fund every Warrior for all treatment they apply for. Currently, FHF funds approximately one million dollars a year in hardships, and we would like to see this number double within the next year.  

    We want to show all Warriors, from Army Rangers to Sheriff’s deputies, from Marines to local EMTs, that you are worthy of healing, and don’t worry about the bill. We’ll pick up the tab. You deserve it.  

    If you or someone you know is struggling with suicidal feelings, the Veterans Crisis Line is available 24/7 for veterans and service members in crisis, and their friends and families. Dial 988 then Press 1 to chat live or text 83825.Warriors Heart also has a 24 hour hotline: (888) 598-4875. And if you are interested in learning more about Philanthropy Roundtable’s work with organizations serving veterans, please contact Philanthropy Roundtable Program Director Clarice Smith.  

  • Will the “Apprenticeship Degree” Come to America? 

    A version of this essay by Reach University President Joe E. Ross first appeared in Inside Higher Ed on July 25, 2023.  

    Philanthropy Roundtable is pleased to share this essay by Joe E. Ross, president of Reach University. Ross and his team have worked to provide an innovative model that creates pathways to opportunity for individuals working within educational communities while simultaneously solving one of the largest problems plaguing our nation’s schools today – teacher talent pipelines. Reach University is providing a low-cost solution to the barrier of credentialing for individuals who are best positioned to meet the educational needs of their local communities through a groundbreaking apprenticeship model.  

    Among high school seniors, a privileged few get to pick between elite, world-renowned colleges like Columbia, Duke, Harvard, MIT, Northwestern, Stanford, Wellesley or Yale.  

    What if they could spend their next few years at investment bank Goldman Sachs instead?  

    Some now can. Dozens of famous employers — including Goldman Sachs and other corporate luminaries like Deloitte, GE, IBM, J.P. Morgan, Nestlé, UBS and Rolls Royce — have begun to offer a four-year paid “apprenticeship” that leads to a debt-free bachelor’s degree.   

    What’s the catch?  

    Well, to apply for the Goldman Sachs gig and others like it, you need to be based in the United Kingdom. Here in the United States, the apprenticeship-to-degree model is only beginning to emerge, particularly for working adults who otherwise lack access to college. If the idea takes off, it could be a long-term solution to the $1.7 trillion student debt crisis and restore lagging faith in American higher education.  

    How does this model work?  

    Imagine a job – a paid job – that turns into a degree. Applicants apply to the employer. The diploma is technically conferred by a collaborating university. But the action happens outside the Ivory Tower. Half of the learning comes from on-the-job work. The rest comes from job-relevant classes typically held outside of working hours. Tuition is largely paid for as part of the learner’s compensation. There are no student loans. 

    Early adopters of a similar approach in the United States include state education agencies and K-12 school districts seeking to address the teacher shortage. The nonprofit Reach University created a debt-free, apprenticeship-based bachelor’s degree specifically for school employees in Alabama, Arkansas, California, Colorado and Louisiana. Launched in fall 2020, the fully job-embedded program has grown from 50 candidates to over 1,500 in less than three years.  

    The federal Pell grant typically covers all but $2,000 of the cost of the job-embedded degree program. Philanthropy or Labor Department apprenticeship funding covers most of the remaining tuition, so each candidate’s out-of-pocket contribution is capped at $900 per year. That’s enough to ensure some skin in the game, while keeping the program affordable without student debt.  

    Dr. Heath Grimes is the superintendent of the rural Russellville City School District in northwest Alabama. The majority of students in Russellville are Hispanic but the district has had a hard time recruiting bilingual staff. Grimes began last year to recruit prospective hires who had graduated from the local community college. He positioned the district as a kind of “transfer institution” where they could use their job to turn their associate degree into a bachelor’s degree.   

    Elizabeth Alonzo, who held an associate degree in business, was among the first to accept this unusual offer. She now serves as an English language aide. Her job is a kind of apprenticeship where what she does at work renders both a paycheck from the district and academic credit from Reach University. Less than a year from now, Alonzo will graduate with the bachelor’s degree she needs to become a teacher. 

    She will be the first fully bilingual elementary school teacher in Russellville.  

    For now, the apprenticeship-to-degree program at Reach exclusively serves school employees – classroom aides, coaches and bus drivers, for example – who aspire to become teachers, and who first need to earn a bachelor’s degree.  

    But could this idea expand in the United States to fields outside of teacher preparation?  

    The answer is yes. Just look at what’s happening in the United Kingdom. More than 100 universities now offer so-called “degree apprenticeships” in fields ranging from management consulting to medicine, and more than 40,000 new students enroll each year. Robert Halfon, the U.K. minister for higher education and skills, likes to say that “degree” and “apprenticeship” are his two favorite words.  

    The ordering of those words — degree before apprenticeship — reflects the complexity of the apprenticeship system in the United Kingdom, where the “degree apprenticeship” is the pinnacle of a multi-level system that also includes the “intermediate apprenticeship” and “advanced apprenticeship.” This nomenclature does not translate on our side of the Atlantic. It makes more sense to refer to the American version as the “apprenticeship degree.”  

    After all, amid skyrocketing student debt, it’s not the apprenticeship that needs to be modified. It’s the degree.  

    That’s why Reach University is bringing together policymakers, philanthropists, employers and entrepreneurial leaders in higher education and workforce development to launch a new nationwide center to advance the apprenticeship degree – not as a postsecondary alternative, but as a postsecondary option – and to make it mainstream in the United States.  

    We believe the emergence of the apprenticeship degree has three notable implications for the future of American higher education:  

    1. For starters, we’re skeptical of narratives that paint the apprenticeship as a mere “alternative” to college. This is a false binary. An apprenticeship that intentionally leads to a degree provides both near-term job skills and long-term upward mobility.  
    1. Second, we imagine the future of college as the future of work: The workplace becomes a campus. Colleagues become classmates. Classes may be online, but learners are not remote. This would be a big change for higher education. To conflate the apprenticeship degree with an online degree or an executive degree would be like mistaking Superman for a bird or plane. 
    1. Finally, when it comes to the nation’s seemingly intractable student loan crisis, we believe the debt-free apprenticeship degree could save the day. But this will only happen if job-embedded higher education goes mainstream, drawing the imagination of learners across all income levels. 

    Enrique Peñalosa, a former mayor of Bogotá, Colombia, has been quoted describing this third dynamic in the context of urban policy: “The sign of an advanced society is not where the poor have cars, it’s where even the rich use public transportation.” 

    Similarly, we’ll know the apprenticeship degree is changing the landscape of opportunity in America when rich and poor alike aspire to a job that will lead to a good degree.  

    Not the other way around.   

    To learn more about Reach University, visit www.reach.edu. If you are interested in helping accelerate Reach’s work addressing the teacher shortage or supporting Reach’s Fall 2023 launch of the new National Center for the Apprenticeship Degree (NCAD), please contact NCAD Executive Director Eric Dunker, edunker@reach.edu.   

    For more information about other organizations providing Pathways to Opportunity, reach out to Philanthropy Roundtable Program Director Erica Haines.  

  • Mental Health Awareness Month: How Nonprofits Are Helping Individuals in Need

    In honor of Mental Health Awareness Month, Philanthropy Roundtable is highlighting the innovative work of civil society in approaching one of the biggest challenges our country faces: mental illness. With one in five Americans experiencing mental illness each year, there is a significant opportunity for philanthropic leadership in helping to address the needs of these vulnerable individuals and provide support for their families.

    The realities of mental illness in America are staggering:

    • 46% of Americans will meet the criteria for a diagnosable mental health condition sometime in their life, and half of those people will develop conditions by the age of 14.
    • About 3-5% of the U.S. adult population has severe or serious mental illness.
    • 30% of adult Americans with serious mental illness receive no treatment (medication or therapy).
    • 10% of Americans with a mental illness are uninsured, with limited access to treatment.
    • Between 11-20% of veterans who served in Operations Iraqi Freedom and Enduring Freedom experience PTSD and/or other mental health conditions.
    • 1 in 5 kids has a diagnosable mental health condition.

    The above realities are even more nuanced when considering that mental health issues contribute to higher rates of homelessness, hunger, substance abuse, domestic violence and other societal issues, including lower education outcomes for the next generation.

    The Roundtable supports philanthropists committed to fostering overall health and well-being, including those working to address the impact mental health issues are having on individuals and communities. We work to connect funders with organizations that provide vulnerable populations access to care and other resources. From foundations such as the Hackett Family Foundation, the Rees-Jones Foundation, the Marcus Foundation and others, philanthropists are approaching mental illness in ways that are having a positive tangible impact on people’s lives.

    While the mental health initiatives philanthropy supports are vast, below is a sampling of the innovative nonprofits and thought leaders who are making a difference in people’s lives all over the country:

    • Headstrong Project: The Headstrong Project is a nonprofit mental health organization providing confidential, barrier-free and stigma-free PTSD treatment to veterans, service members and family connected to their care. Headstrong’s growing clinical network focuses its capabilities across states where unmet mental health needs are highest. On average, Headstrong treats 1,400 clients per month through 275 clinicians in 15 states and Washington, D.C.
    • Meadows Mental Health Policy Institute: The Meadows Mental Health Policy Institute provides independent, nonpartisan, data-driven and trusted policy and program guidance to ensure all Texans can obtain effective, efficient behavioral health care when and where they need it. Their vision is to be the national leader in treating all people with mental health needs.
    • Stop Soldier Suicide: Stop Soldier Suicide’s mission is to reduce service member and veteran suicide using enhanced data insights, focused client acquisition and suicide-specific intervention services. Their vision is a nation where service members and veterans have no greater risk for suicide than any other American. In 2020, they served more than 700 service members and veterans and their work has reduced clients’ suicide risk by an average of 27%.
    • Treatment Advocacy Center: The Treatment Advocacy Center is a nonprofit dedicated to eliminating legal and other barriers to the timely and effective treatment of severe mental illness. The organization promotes laws, policies and practices for the delivery of psychiatric care and supports the development of innovative treatments for and research into the causes of severe and persistent psychiatric illnesses, such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. In the past year, the organization was involved in passing 12 priority bills related to mental illness, including a federal bill and bills in Alabama, Arizona, California, Colorado, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Missouri, Virginia and Washington.

    Thought leaders and other resources related to approaches to mental health:

    • Dr. Sally Satel reviews Dr. Thomas Insel’s book “Healing: Out Path From Mental Illness to Mental Health” for The Wall Street Journal, discussing how few patients get the care they need.
    • Naomi Schaefer Riley’s op-ed in New York Post entitled “Too Many Children Are at Risk Because of Their Parents’ Mental Illness” discusses mental trauma passed on through generations.
    • DJ Jaffe’s TED Talk at the National Council for Mental Wellbeing evaluates how society may be responsible for misleading government officials into denying violence, rather than taking steps to reduce it with those who are severely mentally ill.
    • The New York Times highlighted the influence of psychiatrist E. Fuller Torrey and his research over the past 40 years into involuntary psychiatric treatment policies for people with schizophrenia and other mental illnesses
    • A report published by Manhattan Institute Senior Fellow Stephen Eide and Adjunct Fellow Carolyn D. Gorman articulates a concept to help those with serious mental health issues before, during and after crisis by focusing on a “Continuum of Care.”
    • Philanthropy Roundtable hosted a webinar discussing the effects of COVID-19 on the national economy and its relation to rising rates of diseases and deaths of despair.
    • Manhattan Institute Senior Fellow Stephen Eide wrote a New York Post op-ed entitled “NYC can be a pioneer in the treatment of the seriously mentally ill,” which considers New York City Mayor Eric Adam’s plan for the city to be more proactive in dealing with psychotic individuals.
    • A Manhattan Institute report by Isabel McDevitt, co-founder of Work Works America, writes about the homeless in America who are able and willing to work, but policy fails to address the employment-based solutions that could better serve them.

    If you are interested in learning more about how Philanthropy Roundtable supports donors committed to addressing our nation’s mental health crisis, please contact Esther Larson, program director at Philanthropy Roundtable here.