UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Jennifer Hesterman, alumna and retired colonel in the U.S. Air Force, will deliver the commencement address for the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences’ spring 2024 baccalaureate degree commencement ceremony. The ceremony is scheduled for 1 p.m. on Saturday, May 4, in the Pegula Ice Arena on Penn State's University Park campus.
Hesterman served in three Pentagon tours and multiple command positions in the field. Her final assignment was as vice commander at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland, where she led installation security, including the protection of Air Force One.
Hesterman is the recipient of the Legion of Merit, the Meritorious Service Medal with five oak leaf clusters, the National Defense Service Medal with one star and the Global War on Terrorism Service Medal.
After her military retirement in 2007, Hesterman worked as a cleared defense contractor researching terrorism, organized crime, radicalization and the exploitation of the internet. She now provides security assessments for our nation’s critical infrastructure, advises two Department of Homeland Security Centers of Excellence and designs and instructs graduate level security courses for the Defense Counterintelligence and Security Agency with the Department of Defense.
She holds a doctoral degree from Benedictine University, master of science degree in applied behavioral science from Johns Hopkins University, a master of science in military operational art and science from Air University, and a bachelor of science degree in geography from Penn State. She was a National Defense Fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, attended the Harvard Senior Executive Fellows program and was a senior fellow at the Center for Cyber and Homeland Security at George Washington University.
Hesterman’s book, “Soft Target Hardening: Protecting People from Attack,” was the ASIS Security Industry Book of the Year for 2015. The second edition was the ASIS Security Industry Book of the Year for 2019, and Social Sciences Book of the Year for Taylor & Francis. She also authored “Soft Target Crisis Management” in 2016, “The Terrorist-Criminal Nexus” in 2013 and numerous journal articles.
A lifelong space enthusiast, Hesterman is an analog astronaut and performs research in austere, remote locations to advance human spaceflight. Her husband, John, is a retired military general officer and their daughter, Sarah, 25, is a renowned gender equality advocate.
Hesterman said that her family enjoys exploring our beautiful planet and, among other journeys, her family has visited both the North and South Poles.
More information about commencement can be found at http://commencement.psu.edu/.