MEET THE FOUNDER
BUILT FROM LIVED EXPERIANCE
KYLE BAKER | FOUNDER, THE PARTNER FOUNDATION
Police Officer ~ Medal of Valor Recipient ~ First Responder Advocate
The Partner Foundation wasn’t created from an idea on a whiteboard. It grew from an experience that changed my life and from the people who helped me find my way forward afterward.
THE NIGHT THAT CHANGED EVERYTHING
DECEMBER 16, 2020
On December 16, 2020, I responded to what began as a single-vehicle crash. Within minutes, it became an active shooter situation.
During the encounter that followed, Officer Jason Shuping was killed, another officer shot and I came face-to-face with the armed suspect and was forced to defend my own life and the lives of others.
That night became part of a much larger season of loss. My father had been killed in a tractor-trailer crash a little over a year earlier and just 36 hours after the shooting, my wife and I lost our first child to miscarriage.
Three life-changing traumas, one after another, and no roadmap for what came next.
“WE ARE TRAINED TO SURVIVE THE CALL.
WE ARE RARELY TRAINED FOR WHAT COMES AFTER.”
WHAT CAME AFTER
THE ROAD BACK WASN’T STRAGIHT.
Grief. Trauma. Guilt. Anger. Fear - An 18-month fog I couldn’t climb out of.
Through faith, therapy, EMDR and the support of organizations and non-profits, I started to heal.
There wasn’t one program that fixed everything. There were people.
People who understood. People who connected me with something helpful. People who stayed around.
FAITH
Leaned on something bigger than me.
PEER SUPPORT
Connecting with those who get it.
THERAPY
Finding help that worked.
RESILIANCE
A slow daily decision to keep moving forward.
RESOURCES
Finding the tools I needed.
FAMILY
The reason I kept fighting forward.
WHY
THE PARTNER FOUNDATION
That experience changed the way I think about supporting First Responders.
Sometimes what a First Responder needs after a critical incident aren’t another brochure, another phone number, or someone telling them what they should be feeling.
Sometimes they need another human being who can say, “I’ve been there, here’s what helped me.”
That is the heart of the idea behind The Partner Foundation.
Resources that help
We connect First Responders with vetted resources that actually make a difference.
Through The Lived Experience Network (LEN). We connect First Responders with others who have walked a similar road.
a symbol that starts conversations
connection that helps
The P.A.R.T.N.E.R Coin opens the door to connection, support, and hope for what comes next.