Melody Joiner was born and raised in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, but her roots stem from Mississippi. Her parents have been married for 53 years and are still going strong. She is the youngest of her siblings and has close-knit relationships with her fourteen nieces and nephews. She has 24 years of progressive, wide-ranging experience in human services, covering areas committed to improving the quality of life of individuals and their communities as well as helping state, county, and local social service organizations perform at their best. Melody has worked in the areas of child welfare, community- and county-level corrections, county- and state-level child support, and behavioral health at the county level and in the nonprofit sector. Melody has both a bachelor’s and master’s degree in Criminal Justice and an MBA. Additionally, Melody spent several years working in behavioral health quality assurance and compliance, and she served as an advocate for client rights. Throughout the years, Melody’s life experiences have fostered her knowledge, skillset, and insight to understand people from different walks of life, both as individuals and within groups, and the varied factors of human behavior, including the influence and impact of cultural, societal, and economical structures. Melody has the versatility to adapt to any environment and possesses the capacity to fill a variety of roles, including her last role as a Project Director overseeing a multi-million-dollar SAMHSA behavioral health grant for an assisted outpatient treatment program.