Savannah, Ga., Dec 09 – VAUSA, a Savannah-based virtual staffing company, was inducted into the Department of Defense’s Military Spouse Employment Partnership (MSEP) on Dec 9, 2020, in a virtual ceremony. VAUSA joins 85 new partners to MSEP – bringing the number of employers to 500.
MSEP connects military spouses with hundreds of partner employers who commit to recruit, hire, promote and retain military spouses. Since its inception in 2011 MSEP employers have hired more than 175,000 military spouses.
Brett Baker, a former Army Ranger based at Hunter Army Airfield, and his spouse, Mary Elaine Baker, a former Chatham County school teacher, started VAUSA (formerly known as Patriot Advantage) in 2018 in response to their experiences as a military family. Recognizing the values, resiliency and capabilities military spouses possess and the opportunities afforded by the digital economy, their business model matches this tremendous talent pool of individuals who often need to work remotely with entrepreneurs who need to spend more of their valuable time creating and growing their business. Over 70 percent of their virtual assistants are military spouses.
“Joining MSEP is one more way we can demonstrate our commitment to supporting military spouses and service members,” said Mary Baker. “There are about one million military spouses in our global military community, many of them right here in the Coastal Empire and Lowcountry, working hard to keep their families strong while their service member trains and deploys to protect our freedoms. Reducing the military spouse unemployment rate, which was 24 percent in 2017, is a national issue. Joining MSEP helps us do our part to address this need while also being smart business.”
About Spouse Education and Career Opportunities
The MSEP initiative is part of DOD’s broader Spouse Education and Career Opportunities program. The department established the SECO program to provide education and career guidance to military spouses worldwide, offering free, comprehensive resources and tools related to career exploration, education, training and licensing, employment readiness and career connections. This program also offers free career coaching services six days a week.
