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Recent Blog Posts

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Teaching Bill Negotiation as a Financial Skill

By Community Engagement

In this blog, we explore how bill negotiation can serve as a practical and empowering financial skill for service members and their families. Bill negotiation is an often-overlooked strategy that can create immediate breathing room in a household budget — without cutting services or opening new accounts. By preparing ahead, referencing competitor pricing, and asking for retention or loyalty discounts, clients can often lower recurring expenses with a single phone call and redirect those savings toward debt repayment, savings, or other financial priorities.

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Food Insecurity and Its Connection to IPV in Military Communities

By Health and Well-Being

Food insecurity among military-connected families is more than a nutrition issue — it is a stability and readiness concern. With roughly one in four military households affected, the stress of unmet basic needs can strain mental health, family functioning, and overall well-being. This blog post covers the foundations of food insecurity for military-connected populations and its connection with IPV.

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Building Resilience Through Problem-Solving Skills

By Community Engagement

Problem-solving is more than fixing what’s broken—it’s a core skill for staying calm, thinking clearly, and adapting when challenges show up at work or in training. This blog breaks down the difference between everyday and professional problem-solving, offers simple reflection and practice tools, and shares strategies for providers to teach these skills in ways that build confidence and resilience over time.

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Trust as Invisible Infrastructure: Five Dimensions That Shape Collective Action

By Practicing Connection

Collective action doesn’t rise or fall on org charts or agreements—it depends on the invisible infrastructure of trust. Drawing on our Practicing Connection podcast series, this blog post explores five dimensions of trust that shape whether people feel they belong, speak honestly, follow through, care for one another, and honor local wisdom. Strengthening these everyday foundations can make collaboration in support of military and veteran families more sustainable and more effective.

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Supporting Military Spouse Employment: Cognitive Information Processing Career Theory

By Community Engagement

Military spouses face frequent relocations, systemic barriers, and emotional strain, making career growth challenging. This post explores how cognitive information processing (CIP) theory offers an evidence-based framework for addressing both the practical and psychological dimensions of career decision-making. By integrating structure, self-knowledge, and emotional awareness, CIP provides career practitioners with tools to better support military spouses in building agency and clarity amid ongoing change.

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Financial Secrets in Relationships: Implications for Counselors and Financial Educators

By Community Engagement

Financial secrecy, whether it’s hidden debt, undisclosed spending, or secret savings, can be a source of conflict in relationships, creating rifts that spill into financial and therapeutic counseling sessions. When couples avoid discussing money or start keeping financial secrets, the consequences can have ripple effects in other areas of their relationship. What drives these behaviors, and how can service providers help couples navigate financial secrecy?

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Spouses on the Frontline: Battling Depression in the Fight for Employment

By Health and Well-Being

Employment challenges faced by military spouses can significantly affect mental health, with research showing higher rates of depressive symptoms among those who are unemployed or underemployed. This blog explores how frequent relocations, military-related stress, and barriers to employment intersect—and highlights resources that can help support spouses’ well-being.

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Building Resilience Through Teamwork Skills

By Community Engagement

Teamwork is about more than working with others; it’s about building cooperation, trust, and shared responsibility. When you can reliably contribute to a team, you build confidence. That confidence helps you bounce back from challenges. In other words, strong teamwork supports resilience. In many workplaces, jobs aren’t done alone. Employers look for people who can collaborate, share tasks, communicate differences, and support each other. In this blog, learn how you can boost collaboration and teamwork in the workplace.

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The New Student Welcome Wagon: Creating a Positive School Environment for Military Kids

By Community Engagement

Moving on average every 2-3 years, military kids face change quite often (DOD, 2023). These changes are often familiar, yet uniquely challenging. One of these often familiar changes is military family relocation to a new military installation, a new community, and a new school. Changes like these lead to the disruption of established friendships and can also affect academic progress.

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