25th Annual Veterans Vigil

The 25th annual Veterans Vigil will take place on November 9 and 10 at Texas A&M University-Commerce. The Vigil will kick off with a reception on Wednesday at 9:30 a.m. in the Rayburn Student Center (RSC) pre-function area followed by the opening ceremony at 10:00 a.m. in the conference rooms. At 11:00 a.m., a processional will take place to light the vigil flame that will burn continuously until it is extinguished at the closing ceremony on Thursday, November 10, at 4:30 p.m.

This year's guest speaker is David C. Hurley, Ph.D. Dr. Hurley received his doctorate in Criminal Justice from the University of Cincinnati in 2003 and has broad experience both as a researcher and a practitioner. As a researcher, his initial focus centered on social, situational, and environmental factors that predicted and influenced human behavior and the corresponding affect upon police operations. After 9/11 he used his background in social science to help pioneer the field of socio-cultural intelligence for the U.S. Department of Defense. He has worked at Central Command and other U.S. Intelligence Agencies developing models to predict terrorist and insurgent behaviors such as the placement of improvised explosive devices; discovering neighborhood and community variables to assist in counter insurgency operations; and analyzing how cognitive cultural factors affect terrorists and insurgents' perception and decision-making.

Dr. Hurley is also an experienced instructor with over 17 years teaching experience. Currently, at Texas A&M University-Commerce, his focus is intelligence, terrorism, policing, crime prevention, homeland security and criminal justice administration. He is the Director of the online graduate program: Master of Science in Applied Criminology. Previously, he taught socio-cultural dynamics to Department of Defense intelligence analysts and developed and taught human intelligence targeting courses for a National Intelligence Agency. He has developed curriculum and conducted on-site training for police departments and Ohio, Kentucky and Indiana.

Dr. Hurley is still active in the U.S. Army Reserves and is currently Chief Warrant Officer 2 (CW2) with 26 years of experience. He spent 17 of those years doing intelligence and counterintelligence in the Special Forces Community. CW2 Hurley is a veteran of both Afghanistan (Operation Enduring Freedom) and Iraq (Operation Iraqi Freedom). Of Dr. Hurley's many medals, he includes his Bronze Star, the Combat Infantryman Badge, and the Jump Wings as the most important. These medals reward him for heroic action, personal action during ground combat, and parachuting, respectively.

The closing ceremony will take place on Thursday, November 10 on the walking mall of the RSC at 4:30 p.m. with the extinguishing of the vigil flame and a performance by the university chorale. In addition to Vigil activities, veterans can also receive a 10% discount at the university bookstore from November 07-11 with Military ID.