Beth founded Switchback Institute to address the challenges of people in high impact careers. She is a coach, certified through the International Coaching Federation and has 30 years’ experience in strategic planning, leadership development and workforce resilience spanning government, private and faith-based communities. She spent 13 years in the Colorado Departments of Human Services, Public Health and Environment, and Public Safety (CDPS) working in disaster response. She served as Department Manager for Organizational Development, State Training Officer, Public Information Officer and Behavioral Health Specialist.

Beth created the CDPS Leadership Strategies Institute and co-led the development of a statewide system for standardized behavioral health response during disasters; she served as the state’s behavioral health lead during large-scale catastrophic incidents. Beth’s resilience material has been delivered in various formats to over 100 agencies and conferences nationally and internationally.

Beth has been married to Jim for 33 years and they have two daughters, Kate (31, a middle school teacher) and Carly (28, an artist and reiki master). She received her Master’s Degree in Strategic Communication and Leadership from Seton Hall University and her B.A. in Sociology from The Colorado College.

Laura Armstrong is the founding Executive Director of Heart-J Center for Experiential Learning, a nonprofit organization in Loveland, Colorado. She was immersed in hands-on learning from toddlerhood, tagging along on her biologist parents' field expeditions in the mountains, forests, rivers, and deserts of Colorado and Utah. Laura spent summers during college leading teams of teenage Junior Rangers building trails in the City of Boulder Mountain Parks, with an emphasis on teaching the personal rewards of hard work, teamwork, safety, commitment to quality, and having fun outdoors. Later, as a park ranger, she led hikes and gave presentations about the natural history of the Boulder area, in addition to search and rescue and wildland firefighting. Laura served as administrative director for the Center for Resourceful Building Technology in Montana and as the first executive director of the Legacy Land Trust in Fort Collins, working with downers to protect thousands of acres of ranchland and open space. Prior to launching Heart-J Center in 2014, Laura spent six years designing conservation programs and leading fundraising efforts for LightHawk, an organization that provides flight for conservation projects across North and Central America. Laura is passionate about effective and transformative nonprofit management, forging collaborative efforts, meeting facilitation, and creating interdisciplinary programs that spark new interests and build connections between participants. Laura holds a BA in Biology and Environmental Science from Colby College in Maine and an MS in Environmental Studies from the University of Montana.

Judith (Judy) Baxter, retired in 2022 from the University of Colorado- Anschutz Medical Campus, School of Medicine and Colorado School of Public Health, after 40 years, where she was an Associate Professor focused on teaching and research in diabetes. In her Life Part 2, Judy continues to do leadership training and coaching focused on supporting individuals and organizations to find their highest goals and build/sustain high performance teams across disciplines and settings. Judy is a certified coach for the Team Emotional and Social Intelligence (TESI) and Emotional Intelligence Inventory (EQi2) assessments. Her coaching philosophy embraces practices that support the development of mindful awareness, positive intelligence and emotional/social intelligence. She is active in the Denver community by serving on several boards and working as a volunteer therapy team with her dog Piper.