Imagining a better future

Clinical therapist and Alum of the Year Kendra Conrad Bailey ’03, MA ‘05 ‘humbled’ to journey with clients

Kendra Conrad Bailey ’03, MA ’05, a licensed mental health counselor (LMHC) at her own private Iowa practice, was in a client session when her office received a call from Eastern Mennonite University. When she checked with members of her staff, they assured her the call wasn’t important.

She later learned that while she was helping clients that day, her colleagues were dancing in the halls. They had heard that Bailey, whom they had nominated, had been selected by EMU’s Alumni Association and its Awards and Nominations Committee as the 2024 Alum of the Year.

The award is given annually to an alum who has been recognized for significant achievement in her/his/their profession, community or church. Given to honor the alum, it is also awarded to inspire EMU students and fellow alumni to live lives of service and vocational excellence.

“I felt honored and humbled [to receive the award],” said Bailey, who added that being viewed by her staff in a way that drove them to nominate her was “the greatest gift.”

Bailey, 43, lives on a farm in Riverside, Iowa, with her husband, Jace Bailey ’04, and their three children: Bryce (17), Kale (15), and Jalise (11). An Iowa native, she learned about EMU when college recruiters made a stop at the school she was attending. Upon visiting EMU, Bailey said she “just overwhelmingly felt it was where the Lord was calling me.”

Bailey went on to attend both undergraduate and graduate school at EMU where she earned a bachelor’s degree in elementary education in 2003 and a master’s degree in school and clinical counseling in 2005. She credits her EMU professors with noticing her strengths in the classroom—and recognizing how she might excel as a therapist, a career she decided to pursue after undergrad.

Bailey had no intention of starting her own business until some former clients, colleagues and her husband started asking, “Why not?” She told them she couldn’t imagine it. When her husband suggested it might be God’s will, Bailey confessed there was one place she could see God leading her: to downtown North Liberty, Iowa, in a particular neighborhood that, as far as she knew, had no suitable space.

The following day, a man approached her husband at the bank where he works as a commercial loan officer and asked if he knew anyone looking to rent a space in exactly the spot Bailey had named. She recalled the space needing a lot of work but could “see the vision.” “It’s like the Lord opened my eyes and allowed me to see what could be.”

Bailey obtained a LMHC license in the state of Iowa and opened her business Imagine Therapy Solutions, which draws its mission statement from Ephesians 3:20: “And to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than we ask or imagine, to Him be the glory.”

That was nearly 10 years ago. Now with two locations, the business provides in-person and telehealth services to children, adolescents, adults, and families with a variety of mental and behavioral healthcare needs. “From the day we opened, we’ve had a waiting list and never advertised,” said Bailey, who along with 10 other therapists and five office staffers help clients throughout Iowa to envision themselves achieving their goals so that they can take the necessary steps for self-improvement.

“I enjoy sitting with clients one-on-one to be able to walk with them,” Bailey said. “I am humbled that people allow me to journey with them in their life story.”

In addition to carrying a full-client caseload at Imagine, Bailey provides supervision to therapists in training who are working to acquire their mental health license. She wrote “Tower of Trust,” an interactive storybook for children teaching them the value of second chances, and also speaks publicly on the topic of mental health to surrounding organizations, churches and schools.