Dana Tucker had everything lined up. He had almost completed his MBA at the Marriott School, he had a lucrative job offer, and after many moves he was finally ready to settle down. Then duty called. Major Tucker was told to prepare for deployment to Iraq.
“It wasn’t a convenient time, but there’s never a convenient time to have a war,” Tucker says. He packed up; said goodbye to his wife, Christine, and their four children; and left for training. He completed his MBA coursework through BYU Independent Study while stationed at Fort Riley, Kansas.
After a brief stay in Kuwait, he left for the hot sands of Iraq to direct the Numaniyah National Police Academy, one hundred miles southeast of Baghdad. Almost two thousand Iraqi National Police train at the academy each month. Civilian contractors train the Iraqi forces in police tactics, human rights, diversity, communication, the use of force, evidence gathering, and crime scene management, among other things.
The area is certainly dangerous—some contractors have been killed—but Tucker isn’t on the front lines, and he keeps a positive attitude. “Other than the fact that I’m in a war zone and away from my family, I enjoy the work I do,” Tucker says. “Most of the challenges we face are usually things beyond my control, so I don’t worry much about them.”
Tucker says the hardest part of his assignment is being away from his family for such a long time. Frequent emails, a blog account of his activities, and family prayers shared through phone calls help keep them connected.
In addition to his MBA from the Marriott School in 2008, Tucker earned a PhD in 2002, an MS in 1999 in medical psychology from the Uniformed Services University of Health Science, and a bs in psychology from BYU in 1994.
With his combination of degrees, Tucker is a well-rounded academic individual with a strong business background. That diverse experience helps him accomplish his military assignments in Iraq. “The MBA program was a good experience, because you never know when you’re going to need to apply something,” he says. “I’m finding some way to apply every part of the MBA program here.”
