Gerard was born in 1950 in Essex County, NJ. In 1957, the family moved from Newark to a new housing development on the west end of Bound Brook, NJ. Gerard attended Bound Brook High School where he studied a mixture of general and college prep courses. His favorite subjects were Mechanical / Industrial Drawing, and Spanish. Outside of the high school setting, his interests included music studies on guitar and accordion, Shorinjiryu Kenkokan Karate, and listening to records.
In 1969, Gerard enrolled in the Programming Technology certificate program at Control Data Institute in Millburn, NJ. After completing the certificate program at Control Data Institute, Gerard enlisted in the U.S. Air Force and left for active duty on May 19, 1970.
After being discharged from the USAF, Gerard attended Somerset County College in North Branch, NJ to study for an A.A.S. degree in Data Processing where he maintained a Dean’s List average. He went on to finish a B.S. degree in Computer Science from Monmouth College in May 1978.
Gerard landed his first computer job with Dun & Bradstreet Corporation through an on-campus interview at Monmouth College. He started working part-time while still attending classes and then full-time after graduation.
In 1981, Gerard left Dun & Bradstreet for a new position in Flemington, NJ with Burroughs Corporation in the Technical Information Organization (TIO). The Flemington Plant was relatively new and housed the Terminal Systems Group (TSG) that relocated from Warren, NJ. TIO had the responsibility to provide customer and field technical support for products developed and manufactured at various Burroughs facilities worldwide. In 1982, Burroughs moved forward with plans to OEM the Convergent Technologies CTOS microcomputer system. Burroughs renamed CTOS to BTOS and marketed the system under the B20 product line. Gerard participated on the B20 product launch team as the COBOL / Access Methods specialist.
In 1986, Sperry and Burroughs merged to form Unisys Corporation. During Gerard’s tenure in the Unisys Product Assurance and Support (PA&S) group he was awarded the following Exemplary Action / Short-Term Achievement awards:
- B20 Language Products support
- Tracking/Optic Reporting System support
- Poll/select Digilog 820 automated test suite development
- UTS Emulator qualification
- Planning, organizing and implementing Yourdon Structured Methodology training
Gerard earned his M.S. in Computer Science degree in 1988 from New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT) while employed at Unisys. His Master’s Project was A Poll/Select Protocol Test Driver written in BTOS Pascal using BTOS Bytestream API procedures.
After leaving Unisys in July 1991, Gerard began working as a software 
consultant with BFR Systems. His first assignment was with MCI as a Sr. System Tester on the Q/2 Message Engine, Multi-Port Gateway and Desktop project. Gerard’s second assignment through BFR was at Ortho Diagnostic Systems Inc. in Raritan, NJ where he worked as a Product Development Manager on LOMS, a Laboratory Information Management System (LIMS). He was awarded a bonus for leading the team that completed all First-of-Code activities one week ahead of schedule.
In 1995, Gerard first started working with Segue Software’s QA Partner automated regression test tool while on a contracting assignment at Merrill Lynch in Princeton, NJ. Then in February 1997, Gerard founded and chaired the first meeting of the QualityWorks User Group of Central New Jersey. He served as chair through April 1998 and made the following presentations at the monthly meetings:
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- Using Object-Oriented Techniques in QA Partner Test Scripts
- Using the Extension Kit with Rogue Wave Objects
- Coding BUSTER Support in QA Partner
In April 1998, Gerard formed a Pennsylvania Subchapter S Corporation, Advanced Desktop Solutions Inc., and began working his first of several contracting assignments in New York City.
After the 9/11 Attacks on New York City, Gerard took a consulting assignment with AT&T Labs where he performed integration testing on the CallVantage℠ Voice over IP (VoIP) consumer digital phone service.
In 2006, after relocating to Florida, Gerard established his second Subchapter S Corporation, Yalaha Technologies, Inc. Gerard converted this Subchapter S Corp to a Limited Liability Company, Yalaha Technologies, LLC, in 2012.
Gerard also worked part-time for H&R Block as a Tax Associate for the 2009 and 2010 tax seasons in Sanford, Florida.
Gerard is a Chartered Lifetime Member (CITP MBCS) of the British Computer Society. He holds MS and BS degrees in Computer Science; an AAS in Data Processing; a Diploma in Programming Technology; and has acquired the following certifications:
- Certified in CybersecuritySM (CC)
- CompTIA IT Fundamentals
- CompTIA Security+
- ICAgile Certified Professional in Agile Testing (ICP-TST)
- ICAgile Certified Professional (ICP)
- Certified Scrum Product Owner (CSPO) – Inactive
- Certified ScrumMaster (CSM) – Inactive
- Certified Tester Foundation Level (CTFL)
- TestSuite 7.0 Certified Product Specialist (CPS)
- Certified Quality Improvement Associate (CQIA)
- Certified Software Tester (CSTE) – Inactive
Gerard received Bible education from Biblical Theological Seminary in Hatfield, PA where he earned an Evening School Certificate in 1992.