WHO WE ARE
The University of Hawai’i–West Oʻahu (UHWO) was awarded the 2021 and 2022 Targeted Violence and Terrorism Prevention (TVTP) Grant from the United States Department of Homeland Security. Both grants totaling over $1.3 million were awarded to assist the state’s efforts in establishing threat assessment teams and building the state’s threat assessment capacity within the community. UHWO intends to do that through collaborations with the Hawaiʻi State Fusion Center and Threat Team Hawaiʻi.
The UHWO TVTP project team has initiated 5 objectives in hopes to not only build awareness of threat assessment and threat management capacity on one specific audience (for example, education sectors), but to build up on it statewide through education programming and awareness efforts. The team works with threat assessment professionals to provide access to asynchronous training/presentations with intentions of providing information to increase awareness, engagement, and knowledge base in threat assessment, concerning behaviors and radicalization to violence factors which may affect local community as a whole.
One of the many efforts that the team has engaged in is working with public/private K-12 schools, as well as colleges and universities, to help build Behavioral Intervention Teams that meet “national best practice” to conduct threat assessments within their school communities. This effort is known as the implementation of ECHO team. To learn more about the ECHO project, click here: About ECHO.
Meet the Project Team
Beverly Baligad
Principal Investigator
Bev has been a member of the Michigan State Bar since 2004. She currently serves as the Director of Compliance/Title IX Coordinator at the University of Hawaiʻi–West Oʻahu campus. Since 2005, she has worked in various areas in higher education, including but not limited to: Labor Relations, Executive Leadership, Adjunct Faculty, Compliance and Title IX and Threat Management. She has extensive experience in the development and implementation of key compliance areas such as training, investigations, programming/awareness events, process reviews, and case management.
She has been a consultant and trained (face-to-face and webinar formats) institutions across the nation in areas of Title IX, Title IV, Behavior Intervention Team (BIT), VAWA/Campus SaVE/Clery Act, ADA/Section 504, FERPA, EDGARA part 86, Student Conduct, Due Process and First Amendment. She is a current member of the National Association of College and University Attorneys (NACUA), Association of Threat Assessment Professionals (ATAP), and the University of Risk Management and Insurance Association (URMIA) and the National Association of Clery Compliance Officers and Professionals (NACCOP).
Bev has been highly involved in threat assessment and management since 2009. She is a UH DHS National Threat Evaluation and Reporting Office (NTER) Certified Evaluation Master Trainer, Certified CSTAG Trainer, and an authorized Salem-Keizer Trainer. She was awarded two UH DHS Targeted Violence and Threat Prevention grants for 2021 and 2022 totaling over $1.3 million to help build the HI state school threat assessment capacity.
She served as the Consult Group Facilitator (2022), and serves as the Chair for Threat Team Hawaiʻi (2023). Bev continues to train and assist schools and community members in threat assessment.
Lindsey Roberts
Program Director
Lindsey joined the team in April of 2023. Lindsey graduated in 2015 with a Bachelor of Science in Elementary Education from the University of Alabama. She later returned to school to earn a Master of Business Administration from Louisiana State University of 2024. Before joining the team, she taught at an elementary school in Alabama for 6 yers and the in Hawaiʻi for another school year. After joining the team, Lindsey began to familiarize herself with threat assessment through a variety of trainings including Foundations in Behavior Threat Assessment Management training, Digital Threat Assessment training, Digital Threat Assessment training, WAVR-21, TRAP-18, and multiple threat assessment model trainings, and more.
Lindsey has served as part of the Steering Committee for Threat Team Hawaiʻi (TTH), is a TTH Training Subcommittee Co-lead, and is a member of the Association of Threat Assessment Professionals (ATAP).
Lindsey is a U.S. Department of Homeland Security (U.S. DHS) National Threat Evaluation and Reporting Program Office (NTER) Certified Evaluation Master Trainer. This certifies her to train the three different DHS threat assessment trainings: Threat Evaluation and Reporting Overview (TERO), Basic Threat Evaluation and Reporting Course (B-TERC), and Threat Evaluation and Reporting Course (TERC). TERO is currently being used at the beginning of the Foundations Training to give attendees a DHS training and provide a brief overview of why threat assessment is important and how it relates to each individual.
Lindsey is also a certified Basic Digital Threat Assessment Trainer.
Sarah Armstrong
Compliance Specialist
Sarah Armstrong has been a member of the University of Hawaiʻi–West Oʻahu Targeted Violence and Terrorism Prevention (TVTP) grant team since August 2023, acting as the Compliance Specialist and providing programmatic support. Sarah received her Bachelor of Arts in English and French Studies from the University of Portland in the Spring of 2023. In her role as Compliance Specialist on the team, Sarah has conducted extensive research and possesses a wealth of knowledge about the history of threat assessment, the studies informing current national best practices, and landmark cases in the field.
Since joining the team at UH West Oʻahu, Sarah has become certified in several threat assessment models and trainings including the Foundations of Threat Assessment, Comprehensive School Threat Assessment Guidelines (CSTAG), the Department of Homeland Security National Threat Evaluation Reporting Program Office (NTER) Behavior Threat Assessment and Management (BTAM) model, Basic Digital Threat Assessment (DTA), Advanced Digital Threat Assessment, the Workplace Assessment for Violence Risk-21v2 (WAVR-21), and the Terrorist Radicalization Assessment Protocol-18 (TRAP-18). Sarah is a certified trainer for Basic Digital Threat Assessment, providing training on how to find essential, often overlooked information online during threat assessments, and is working toward becoming a certified trainer in other models.
Sarah also serves as a member of the Threat Team Hawaiʻi (TTH) Steering Committee and is a Co-Lead for the TTH Training Subcommittee, planning trainings on a variety of threat assessment and violence prevention related topics for the Hawaiʻi threat assessment community,.
Nadine Castillo
Multimedia Specialist
Nadine Castillo has been a member of the University of Hawaiʻi–West Oʻahu Targeted Violence and Terrorism Prevention (TVTP) grant team since March 2023 as the Multimedia Specialist providing support and expertise in the fields of graphic design, UI (User Interface) and UX (User Experience) design, photography, videography, and more. Nadine has graduated from the UH West Oʻahu Academy for Creative Media (ACM) program and received a Bachelor in Creative Media with a concentration in General Creative Media in May of 2022. She has also previously worked as a Production Specialist for the UH West Oʻahu program. Aside from the creative aspect of her position, Nadine also provides technical support for the team.
Soon after joining the team, Nadine has familiarized herself with threat assessment and management by participating and becoming certified in various threat assessment models and trainings such as the Foundation of Behavioral Threat Assessment and Management, CSTAG, NTER BTAM model, WAVR-21v3, TRAP-18, Basic and Advance Digital Threat Assessment. She is a certified Basic Digital Threat Assessment trainer, providing information and knowledge on the importance of gathering online information and how to conduct a digital threat assessment.
Nadine serves as a member of the Steering Committee under the Training Subcommittee for Threat Team Hawaiʻi. She is also a member of the Association of Threat Assessment Professionals.
SPECIAL MAHALO
Madisyn Schoonover
Former Program Director
Madi Schoonover served as the first Program Director of both the 2021 and 2022 Targeted Violence Terrorism Prevention grant programs awarded from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. As the Program Director, Ms. Schoonover oversaw several training initiatives as well as creating cohorts within the state to build threat assessment expertise within Hawaiʻi. After two successful years of working alongside the Principal Investigator, Madi has begun working in Washington, D.C. and remains closely connected to the UH West Oʻahu team.
This project is funded by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Center for Prevention Programs and Partnerships, opportunity number DHS-22-TTP-132-00-01.