Our Board

Johnny graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison with degrees in Secondary Education and the Humanities. He has owned a landscaping business for twenty five years.

Johnny’s Tai Chi journey began as a means to repair his knees at a Y-TCA class in 2008. He was certified in to teach TCA in 2011, and founded Tai Chi Lake Geneva in 2012. In addition to weekly classes at the Williams Bay Rec Department, he leads Tai Chi by Geneva Lake and volunteers at Make Arthritis Stop Hurting Youth Camp. Johnny is humbled and honored to serve as USTCC Board President.

• jpackard@ustcc.org

Denise is an American College of Sports Medicine certified Exercise Physiologist and Yoga Alliance Registered Yoga Teacher. She discovered TCA through the Arthritis Foundation. Seeing how she and her class participants’ benefit from Dr. Lam’s TCH programs, she has been enthusiastically teaching Dr. Lam’s TCH programs since 2006 at community centers and hospital-based classes. Denise regularly presents TCH programs at various health related support groups, and AF, hospital, and corporate wellness events. She volunteers annually at AF’s Camp Dakota for children living with arthritis. In 2012, Denise attended Pat Weber’s, Sun 73 week-long workshop in Australia. In 2013, she traveled to China to attend Dr. Lam’s Sun 73 workshop. Denise enjoys meeting with TCH instructors in her area to practice Sun 73, TCH programs, and discuss what is working and not working in their classes. In addition she is a personal trainer and teaches functional fitness classes to individuals living with Alzheimer’s disease.

• dmurray@ustcc.org

Sheila has been a chair yoga instructor since 2008 in Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina, and later beginning in 2013 in St. Louis, MO. She started her tai chi journey in 2016 with instructor certification in Tai Chi for Arthritis and Fall Prevention. She is currently the Healthcare Coordinator for the St. Louis Area Agency on Aging where some of her responsibilities include teaching free tai chi and chair yoga classes to seniors. Sheila is originally from St. Louis and has lived in Harare, Zimbabwe from 1980 to 1990. She has a doctorate degree in Higher and Adult Education from the University of Memphis and has taught graduate education courses to the United States military based in Okinawa and Seoul beginning in 2002 for 3 years where she also practiced yoga and witnessed the healing benefits of tai chi among the Okinawans who have the highest number of centenarians in the world.

• sbassoppomoyo@ustcc.org

Kate holds an MS in Rehabilitation Psychology and a PhD in Counseling Psychology, and has taught both undergraduates and graduate students.  Her career included directing a residential program for autistic adults, oversight work for the system of care for persons with developmental and psychiatric diagnoses in NYS, and serving as Director of Labor Relations & Training for NYS Parks.  Semi-retired, Kate has expanded her tai chi related activities and teaches several weekly classes.  She began her journey in search of a way to be physically active despite an aggressive onset of rheumatoid arthritis.  She has been a student twelve years, and a Senior Trainer for two. Kate has been a member of the Scholarship Committee for two years, and will co-chair the Committee with MT Julie Oberhaus next year.  She is honored to serve on the Board of Directors with a special interest in finding ways for the USTCC to be a valuable resource for members.

• kmckee@tchc.info

Julie graduated with honors from Bowling Green State University with a Bachelor of Science in Modern Dance Education and a minor in psychology. She has over 15 years experience teaching movement and over 10 years experience teaching tai chi. She is an active United States Tai Chi Community member and a Master Trainer with the Tai Chi for Health Institute. Over the years she has been working to create a strong Tai Chi for Health family in her local and extended New England community while developing her own business, Dancing Crane Tai Chi. Julie enjoys sharing the wonderful benefits of tai chi with people of all ages in New England.

• joberhaus@ustcc.org

Donnie’s journey into tai chi began after a serious accident affected his balance. He had trained and practiced martial arts as a teen and throughout his military career, and thought tai chi may offer a solution when other forms of exercise had not.

After realizing his tai chi practice let him regain his balance, improved his range of motion, and reduced his arthritic joint pain, Donnie decided to become an instructor in 2015.Since then, Donnie has acquired many certifications to hone both technique and teaching skills.

Donnie has an active teaching schedule at local libraries and churches. He wants his classes to be safe and fun. He sincerely believes smiles and laughter are medication for not only the heart, but the body as well.

Donnie feels that it isn’t the learner who quickly reaches a goal that motivates him; it is those who struggle and take extra mentoring that do. Their success and the smiles that success brings is the ultimate payback.

• dpoling@ustcc.org

• tcrews@ustcc.org

Toni has been a Tai Chi for Health instructor since 2017 and serves on the MemberCare and Scholarship Fundraising Committees on the USTCC.ORG Board. She has been an Information Technology contract Project Manager in the Oil & Gas Industry, the Department of Defense, and the US Army in Anchorage, Alaska and for the United States Army at the Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Alabama. Now retired, Toni teaches Tai Chi at the Dickson, TN Senior Center and YMCA. Toni fell in love with Tai Chi in 1974 but didn’t have an opportunity to study until 1996 when she discovered the Eight Brocades and other Qigong forms preparing her path to Tai Chi. She finds interacting with her participants to create a community to be the most valuable part of practicing and teaching tai chi.

• tdixon@ustcc.org

Nina graduated summa cum laude from the University of Main at Augusta with a Bachelor of Science in Mental Health and Human Services. She has been a TCHI instructor since 2014, and a TCHI Senior Trainer since 2018.

Nina is Community Outreach Coordinator for Healthy Acadia, a non-profit health coalition serving Downeast Maine. Motivated by the health benefits she realizes from regular tai chi practice and her passion to help others help themselves, she launched Healthy Acadia’s Tai Chi for Health program in 2014. To date, over 3,000 people have participated in the program’s free community classes. Nina is honored to be able to help build the tai chi for health community, and to serve as a newly elected board member of the USTCC.

• nzeldin@ustcc.org