Resource Page

Brian Van Brunt, EdD, is the Director of Behavior and Threat Management for D-Prep Safety. Author of over a dozen books, Brian has spent time as a child and family therapist, university professor, assistant deputy director of training at Secure Community Network, partner at TNG, and president of the National Association for Behavioral Intervention and Threat Assessment (NABITA). He is an internationally recognized expert in behavioral intervention, threat assessment, mental illness, crisis preparedness and response, and instructional design. Brian has provided consulting services to schools, colleges, and universities across the country and abroad on a wide variety of topics related to student mental health, counseling, campus violence, and behavioral intervention.

Dr. Baron Brown is a deeply experienced professional in the areas of leadership, law enforcement, public policy, national security and equity-related workplace issues. As a former diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) officer for a southern CA city, he brings both his civil rights and investigative experience from the challenging fields of law enforcement, military operations and higher education at the community college and university levels. Baron has supervised and managed in a large law enforcement agency, and served as an advocate and investigator in discrimination cases. This municipal experience in the areas of diversity, equity and policy were complemented by 12+ years of experience in the U.S. military as a civil rights officer and 3 years as a personnel officer. He is a well-established orator and has served as a public speaker for several non-profit organizations. Baron is impassioned about equity, humanity, and opportunity in higher education, having retired from a Hispanic serving institution (HSI) and visited 31 Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) in his doctoral work covering equity and opportunity and the sense of belonging for historically underserved minority students matriculating through higher education institutions.

Brian Heider serves as the Executive Director of the Workplace Violence Prevention Association and is the President of Axiom Investigations Group, a professional investigation and risk management firm dedicated to serving the business, education, and public safety communities. For more than 23 years, Brian has dedicated his professional life to individual and public safety. Brian started a career in law enforcement in 2000, working as a police officer and then detective for the City of Orange Police Department in Southern California. Specialized assignments Brian worked include sexual assault and child abuse investigations, crime scene investigations, school resource officer, homicide investigator, gang investigator, and narcotics investigator. He was the department’s go-to author of high-profile search warrants and is a court-certified expert in multiple criminal and civil subject matter areas. Brian was also named the California Narcotic Officers Association (CNOA) “Officer of the Year.” In August 2023, Brian launched Axiom Investigations Group to provide the expert professional investigative services to clients throughout California.

Tammy L. Hodo, PhD, has been working in the diversity, equity, and inclusion field for most of her professional career. Being biracial and reared in the Midwest, Tammy learned early on that race, although a social construct, impacts life chances and experiences. She has the lived experience of being both European American and African American. Coming from a middle-class family and being reared in a predominantly white space provided her opportunities she would later learn were not available to everyone that presented/looked like her. She has written peer-review articles about the experiences of minorities in academia.

Charlie Taylor is certified in Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design (CPTED) and is a suicide prevention gatekeeper instructor through the Question, Persuade and Refer (QPR) program. Charlie has a long career history in personal management, interviewing, conflict resolution, hiring practices, performance improvement planning and employee termination. He has certification in Basic Incident Command System for Initial Response (100, 200), National Incident Management System (700, 800) and is a firearm instructor and competitive shooter with the National Rifle Association. Working in tandem with our DPrep Safety team members with expertise in psychology, law enforcement and threat assessment, Charlie supports DPrep Safety with interviews, physical security data gathering, and assessments as well training in situational awareness and all-hazard response during natural and manmade disasters.