Photo By Rachel Larue | Marines from Headquarters and Service Battalion, Headquarters Marine Corps, Henderson...... read more read more
JOINT BASE MYER-HENDERSON HALL, Va. - Headquarters and Service Battalion, Headquarters Marine Corps, Henderson Hall’s Unit, Personal and Family Readiness Program is a one-stop shop for official communication, resources and referral information, readiness and deployment support and volunteer management.
“It doesn’t matter if you’re not married and don’t have kids,” said H&S Battalion Family Readiness Officer Renee Lilley. “If you have a question about anything and aren’t sure where to go, just ask me, because if I don’t know the answer I’m going to find out.”
Lilley said the goal of the UPFRP is to equip and assist Marines and their families in becoming well-informed and self-sufficient by offering a variety of programs to improve their quality of life and to ensure that family readiness on the homefront equates to the Marines’ mission readiness.
Marine Corps Family Team Building is one of those programs and was created to help support a commander’s unit, personal and family readiness program, explained Lilley.
“Typically, you will have Marine Corps Family Team Building at each Marine installation that will support all Marines on that installation with life skills classes,” she said.
Lifestyle Insights, Networking, Knowledge and Skills, or LINKS, is a program within Marine Corps Family Team Building that enhances the readiness of Marines, whether they are single or married, and their families by offering an orientation to the Marine Corps lifestyle.
“We have job fairs, we have career fairs,” she added. “We have a lot of free resources.”
Lilley said readiness and deployment support is a much smaller piece of the Henderson Hall UPFRP program, but it important none the less.
“We don’t have a lot of folks who deploy, but we do have people who go TAD [temporary assigned duty] a lot, that’s an added stressor,” said Lilley.
Another component of the UPFRP is LifeSkills Training and Education, which offers a variety of workshops to facilitate both personal and professional growth. The classes provide skills and education development on topics including relationships, communication and financial management.
“My job is to educate and promote,” she said.
Lilley said that every unit in the Marine Corps has a family readiness officer.
“This is a job that feeds my soul. I’ve worked for many different commanders, I’ve worked for many different sergeant majors and executive officers who have all greatly impacted me and have helped me develop professionally,” she said.
Lilley also oversees the planning for the battalion’s annual daddy-daughter dance, holiday party, family outings and picnics which occur throughout the year as well as dinners in the barracks.
“Organizing dinner in the barracks gets our spouses involved,” she said. “It’s always great because we have a lot of our senior enlisted and officers who will come and participate.”
Lilley’s office is located in Bldg. 29, room 302. Her office hours are from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. weekdays.
| Date Taken: | 09.18.2014 |
| Date Posted: | 09.18.2014 13:37 |
| Story ID: | 142560 |
| Location: | JOINT BASE MYER-HENDERSON HALL, VIRGINIA, US |
| Web Views: | 41 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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