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Tonya Helman, CEO/CoFounder
Tonya has served on the Board of Directors since 2008. She is also one of the Co-founder's. She graduated from Kaplan University Summa Cum Laude in Computer Information Systems and is currently pursuing her MBA from Bellevue University. She runs her own Web Development and Graphic Design company, Oracle Illustrations, LLC where she performs freelance and volunteer work.
Her NFL cheerleading career consists of seven seasons with three NFL teams (Arizona Cardinals, Washington Redskins and San Diego Chargers) reaching from coast to coast and from the NFC to the AFC. Tonya has been on 14 military tours with four organizations to over 20 countries including, Iraq, Bahrain, Afghanistan, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Japan, Cuba and Guam to name a few.
Tonya is a surviving spouse to AW1 Cory Helman who she had met on a AFE tour to the Middle East in 2001 while cheering for the AZ Cardinals. Sweetheart for Soldiers has enabled her to continue her way of giving back to all that serve. She knows first hand what the families go through during a deployment and how much the troops miss "home". Thats what her goal is with Sweethearts, to bring a little bit of home to each troop and their families everyday. |
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Bari Yonkers, Vice President of Community Relations/CoFounder
Bari has served on the Board of Directors since 2008 and is a graduate of Arizona State University with a degree in Communication. While attending school she was an Arizona Cardinals Cheerleader for five seasons, two of which she served as Showteam Captain. Bari was also a member of the "Cheerleaders of America" all star team which went on three tours in 2002 to entertain the troops, hitting an astounding nineteen countries that year. In total, Bari has had the privilege to entertain troops in twenty-three countries on seven troop entertainment tours and has done countless stateside visits as well.
Professionally, Bari has over 6 years of experience working in the Community Relations field and has worked for top organizations such as the Arizona Diamondbacks and TASER International. She recently returned from a year abroad teaching English in South Korea and is currently working for a marketing company in San Diego, CA.
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