Resilience is a common "buzz-word" in many fields, including economics, sociology, urban planning, and emergency management, as well as other fields. Often people refer to resilience as "the ability to return to normal" but in a changing environment what was "normal" may not be reasonable. Whether it is resilience towards acts of terrorism, cyber-attacks, pandemics, and catastrophic natural disasters, our national preparedness for emergencies and disasters is the shared responsibility of all levels of government, the private and nonprofit sectors, and individual citizens. So does Emergency Management provide for Resilience? Do they work together and if so how and what role does government, the private and nonprofit sectors and individual citizens have in emergency management resilience?

James (Jim) Keck is an Associate Professor in the Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness program of the Wilder School of Government and Public Affairs at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU), with over 40 years of expertise in emergency management, homeland security, information technology, transportation, financial management and healthcare administration. He has served as the Deputy State Coordinator for the Virginia Department of Emergency Management (VDEM) and as Assistant Division Administrator for the Security and Emergency Management Division and Assistant Division Administrator for the Maintenance Division for the Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT). In these roles, he conducted business impact analysis and risk assessments for the development of the VDOT central office continuity of operations (COOP) plan, directed the development of the Critical Infrastructure Information (CII) program and managed cyber security programs to assure protection of CII data and personal privacy data. He served in various roles in the health administration field including: Administrator for the Oncology Clinic at the Medical College of Virginia Hospitals and Associate Administrator Director of Ambulatory Care, Chief Financial Officer, Chief Information Officer, Director of Facilities and Planning and Unit Commander while in the United States Air Force. He served in Saudi Arabia as the Chief Medical Administrative Officer for the Air Force following hostile activities during the Gulf War. In addition to teaching Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness classes at VCU he has taught health economics at San Francisco University, San Francisco, CA. He has also served as the Executive Director for the Virginia Emergency Management Association, a professional organization for emergency managers in Virginia.

CCPO Innovation Research Park Building I 4111 Monarch Way, 3rd Floor Old Dominion University Norfolk, VA 23508 757-683-4940