WASHINGTON D.C. – SPARTA, the nation’s leading transgender military service organization, is proud to announce our newest member of the Board of Directors, Melody Stachour. Melody (pronouns she/her) is joining the Board in the role of Director of Community Relations.
As Director of Community Relations, she is looking forward to building new partnerships while strengthening the deep ties with SPARTA’s existing partners. SPARTA enhances its mission of ensuring open and equal service in the United States’ uniformed services by all transgender persons through partnerships with other organizations with similar goals. The common interests shared by these organizations give added value, not only to SPARTA, but to its many individual members.
Melody notes that, “… history is only a guide, and not a roadmap,” and she, “… doesn’t want to be constrained by ‘what we’ve always done’.” She is conscious that, “it’s not what got us here and it’s not what will take us into the future.”
Melody brings to SPARTA her combined seventeen-and-a-half years of combined active and reserve service in the United States Navy. Over her career, she has completed two deployments. Upon her selection as Senior Enlisted Leader for her present unit, she became the first openly transgender Sailor selected in any command triad role in the United States Navy. In her civilian career, she is employed by a Fortune 500 company, where she is also on the board of the company’s LGBTQ+ Business Resource Group.
Melody has previously served SPARTA and its members in the role of chapter leader for the US Navy, US Coast Guard, and NOAA’s uniformed service for the past three years.
