Betsy Beard

Betsy Beard currently serves as the editor for the national quarterly TAPS Magazine. As editor, Betsy works with survivors to share their stories of hope as well as working with professionals in the field of grief, loss, and bereavement. Under her leadership the magazine earned the 2010 Award of Excellence from Apex Awards for Publication Excellence.

Betsy has written articles published in newspapers, Living with Loss Magazine, and Hospice Foundation of America’s 2008 Living with Grief, as well as writing various other TAPS publications. In 2010, she authored the award-winning children’s book, Klinger, A Story of Honor and Hope, for TAPS.

Betsy has served as a peer mentor, support group facilitator, and workshop presenter at TAPS regional and national seminars and currently co-facilitates the Raleigh, North Carolina TAPS Care Group. She has presented workshops on bereavement for the Department of Veterans Affairs’ regional and national trainings and participated in the Casualty Notification training for the United States Army Casualty and Mortuary Affairs Operation Center (CMAOC).

Betsy discovered TAPS in 2004 shortly after the death of her only son, Army Specialist Bradley S. Beard, who was killed in action in Ar Ramadi, Iraq. After volunteering for several years, Betsy joined the TAPS staff in 2007. Prior to the death of her son, Betsy worked in the banking industry, home-schooled her children through high school, and spent 21 years working in hospital laboratories as a Medical Laboratory Technologist.