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Air Force Academy cadets visit McGuire

  • Published
  • By Airman 1st Class Rebekah Phy
  • 305th Air Mobility Wing public affairs
McGUIRE AIR FORCE BASE, N.J. --  The second wave of Air Force cadets recently arrived here as part of "Operation Air Force", a summer program designed for soon-to-be lieutenants to learn about the Air Force at a unit level. 

This real-world program helps the cadets develop a greater appreciation of the duties, problems, responsibility and training they will encounter after graduating from the Air Force Academy and becoming a second lieutenant. 

Approximately 1,700 cadets are spread out at 50 bases throughout the world in this summer's program. McGuire received 34 cadets, divided into three groups. 

"Operation Air Force is a very valuable tool for cadets," said Lt. Col. Todd Pennington, OAF program officer in charge. "It is also very valuable for bases when receiving cadets ... the cadet is usually assigned to a junior officer who helps guide them while they learn leadership skills - it's a learning opportunity for both sides." 

Each cadet is assigned to a specific unit for three weeks; they may even jump from unit to unit during their time at a base. Since many cadets are undecided on their future career path, they get to see different jobs available in the Air Force and become acquainted with a variety of Airmen. They also get to interact with the enlisted force, something they may have not had the opportunity to do while at the Air Force Academy. 

Cadet 1st Class David Hooper, assigned to the 305th Operations Group, agreed that he and his fellow cadets have not had much experience working with enlisted Airmen. "At the academy, we have very limited time with enlisted members ... and when we do see them it's mostly senior NCOs. We've met outstanding enlisted personnel here though. It's good to see a different side of the junior-ranking Airmen; it gives us another perspective of how things work." 

According to the OAF staff, there are four distinct courses for cadets in the summer program; NonComm, third lieutenant, brevet lieutenant and brevet lieutenant-deployed. 

The NonComm course is designed to help the cadets gain an appreciation for Air Force enlisted culture and duties, value the impact of teamwork on specific missions, understand the specific enlisted expectations of officers, appreciate the role officers play in enlisted promotion and development, and appreciate the impact of coaching and instruction on work performance. During this course, the cadets also partake in two mentoring sessions with a senior NCO to better understand their objectives. 

The third lieutenant course helps the cadets gain an appreciation of how operations and support functions integrate and contribute to successfully accomplishing a wing's mission, understand the role of company grade officers at the squadron level, comprehend the leadership opportunities, supervisory responsibilities, and nominal career path for at least two career fields, and to understand the expectations of CGOs and senior NCOs. 

The brevet lieutenant course is geared particularly toward those cadets who may know their future Air Force career path. The course helps cadets gain appreciation for intricacies of a single career field of interest or forecasted specialty, receive practical experience in that area, and gain appreciation for the challenges of organizational leadership in that career field. 

The brevet lieutenant-deployed course includes all the objectives of the brevet lieutenant course, as well as helping the cadets understand the basic requirements of the deployment process. The course is also aimed to help the cadets gain an appreciation for the challenges and demands of AEF operations and the challenges of organizational leadership in a deployed location. 

As the second wave of cadets finish up their time at McGuire, Cadet Hooper, a senior at the academy, said it's been a great experience. In three weeks, he's made new friends, visited another part of the country, experienced real-world workplace situations and gained knowledge to take into his next year of school and, soon enough, into the operational Air Force. 

"The cadets who came here last year said McGuire was really good to them - they had a great time and learned a lot," Cadet Hooper said. "I will pass the same message on to next year's cadets - McGuire has been great!"