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Army announces creation of Future Soldier Preparatory Course
U.S. Army Public Affairs
WASHINGTON — The Depart- ment of the Army announced July 26 the creation of a new program designed to help potential recruits to meet the service’s rigorous enlistment standards.
The Future Soldier Preparatory Course pilot program — set to start in early August at Fort Jackson, South Carolina — will provide edu- cation and training to help American youth overcome academic and physi- cal fitness barriers to military service.
“The Future Soldier Prep Course allows recruits, who meet all other qualifications for enlistment, a path to serve,” said Gen. Paul E. Funk II, CommandingGeneral,Trainingand Doctrine Command. “The young men and women who will partici- pate in this pilot have the desire to improve themselves and want to honorably serve their country. This course is a great way to increase op- portunities for them to serve without
sacrificing the quality needed across our force.”
The course is in response to the precipitous drop in the number of young Americans meeting Army enlistment standards. Only 23 per- cent fully meet the Army’s eligibility requirements, down from 29 percent in recent years. The effects of the COVID pandemic over the past two years have only exacerbated bar- riers to enlistment for many young Americans, with drops in test scores and rising obesity across the nation.
“This course is one of many ap- proaches the Army is taking to invest in America’s young people,” stated Funk. “We have to acknowledge that society has changed and help our youth improve so they can benefit from the training and opportuni- ties that Army service provides. The Army is still the best place for young people to achieve their potential.”
The pilot program will provide focused academic and fitness instruc- tion to help recruits meet the Army’s
desired accession standards for body fat composition and academic test performance prior to basic training. It includes two separate tracks: a fitness program and an educational program for recruits who need help improving their scores on the Armed Forces Qualification Test (AFQT).
Individuals in both tracks are projected to remain in the FSPC for a maximum of 90 days, with opportunities every three weeks to leave the program and ship to basic training if they meet or exceed the Army’s desired accession standards.
As part of their pre-enlistment process, all trainees will still have to take the gender-neutral Occupation- al Physical Assessment Test (OPAT), administered by a recruiter, to qualify for the physical demand level required for an Army MOS prior to their participation in the preparatory course. Access to this program will allow these individuals who already meet all other qualifications for enlistment - to include moral and
medical accessions standards - a path to serve. Recruits admitted through this program will further be required to meet all Department of Defense enlistment and training standards, ensuring the overall quality of the force.
Recruits with an Armed Ser- vices Voluntary Aptitude Battery (ASVAB) score of 21-30 may only participate in the academic track. Re- cruits with an ASVAB score between 42-49 may be allowed to voluntarily participate in both tracks, the fitness portion prior to basic combat train- ing and the academic portion follow- ing basic training. Individuals who improve their score above a 50 move into the desired higher standard test score categories and are potentially eligible for additional MOS oppor- tunities or enlistment incentives. A score of 31 is the minimum required under current accessions guidelines for recruits in the fitness track.
The fitness course is an expansion of the current Assessment of Recruit
Motivation and Strength (ARMS) 2.0 program, which allowed recruits above the two percent body fat stan- dard. Those recruits shipped straight to basic training, were closely tracked throughout their enlistment, and ultimately subject to existing Army physical fitness standards. The
expansion of ARMS 2.0 will place recruits who exceed the accession body fat composition standard by greater than two percent, but no more than six percent in the fitness track of the Future Soldier Prepara- tory Course.
“This course gives us an opportu- nity to unleash unrealized potential by surrounding trainees with experts that they likely would not have access to at home,” said Brig. Gen. Patrick Michaelis, the U.S. Army Training Center and Fort Jackson Com- manding General. “With the right instruction and professional support, we are confident they will be able to perform successfully and meet the standards expected of every Soldier.”
an issue for Story because change is normal for any organization, he said.
“The challenge is not to get frustrated, but focused; and for a healthcare organization, that focus is provided the absolute best for our patients and our community,” Story said.
According to Story, an organization has to be able to adapt and shift based off of the changing environment.
“We must also be a learning organization, where we are not rigid in our process, but open to define new ways to provide care to our Irwin community and families,” he added.
Parson said she is also proud of the ac- complishments of her staff including sev- eral Soldiers gaining acceptance to the Army Medical Department Enlisted Commissioning program, the Interservice Physician Assistant Program, and Officer Candidate School, and civilian staff earning Civilian of the Quarter and Civilian of the Year awards.
“It’s really exciting seeing people grow,”
able to make changes and track personnel and pay transactions in real-time from any device anywhere they have internet connectivity.”
“The Army is changing with the times, but changing in a way that supports our Soldiers and families,” added Riley. “We wanted to lean forward with the pay schedule change because we know that change is hard for a lot of people, but if we can do this gradually as we get closer to IPPS-A Release Four, we can minimize the impact to our military Soldiers and families
Parson said. “I think that is what I have loved most about command.”
Commanding a recruiting battalion prior to commanding at Weed ACH prepared Parson for the teamwork necessary to run a hospital that operates 24-hours a day, she said.
“I knew that it takes teamwork across the entire organization and the installation, but I think it reinforced that lesson over and over because even within the hospital you have many different departments and you really need to rely on the leadership in those departments in order to run the day-to-day operations,” Parson said.
For Parson, her role commanding the hos- pital made up one aspect of why she loved Fort Irwin, but there were many more.
“It’s been such a great environment with the team we have within the hospital, the relation- ship I had with the other command teams, and just being able to do really neat stuff like flying in helicopters, going out for box tours, [and] Soldiers being able to attend the Oscars
having to make multiple changes all at once.” Prior to the implementation of the cur- rently-used Defense Joint Military Pay System in the 1990s, service members were paid via
check at the end of each month.
“After DJMS, Soldiers had the option to get
half of their pay on the 15th of each month, and many chose to go that route to get their pay early,” recalled Kennedy, a retired Army Finance Corps command sergeant major. “A lot of Soldiers liked the change to semimonthly
Army photograph
Col. Michael Story, commander of Weed Army Community Hospital.
and stand on the red carpet,” she said. “Fort Irwin is very remote... but I’ve been able to travel and see so much of California, Nevada and even Arizona.”
From ARMY, Page 2 because it closely approximated the every-two-
weeks of pay that the civilian world received.” Still, some Soldiers didn’t make the switch, and DJMS allowed others to opt into being
paid once at the end of each month.
“DJMS, while it was a great system that had a lot of benefit for our Soldiers at the time, is based on old technology by today’s standards,” concluded Riley. “With this change, we are moving toward IPPS-A, a system that is more auditable, more secure and more transparent.”
From WEED ACH, Page 1 Story said he and his family were excited to get
stationed on the West Coast, especially at Fort Ir- win, which houses the National Training Center. “I have been to Fort Irwin previously as a rotating unit being evaluated,” Story said. “I recalled the tough, realistic training my brigade had experienced here at the NTC prior to de- ployment, and absolutely believe in its tenet of
providing tough, realistic training.”
As her time in command ended, Parson re- flected on the goals she set when she first arrived. “I feel like I did accomplish a lot of my goals in setting the positive culture and really building a connection amongst our team and our families and then building a connection
with our local communities,” Parson said. Story said that he also has a goal for his
time in command.
“My continual focus for WACH will be to
provide the best healthcare to our community and find ways to streamline systems and pro- cesses to help access to care,” he said.
From AER, Page 1
“AER has been housed within the Army structure for 80 years and counting to help take care of its own,” said Duncan-Bell. “AER is important and here to be the first choice to our Soldiers, active and retired, and families including our widows and orphans, so they don’t have to resort to outside lenders with high interest rates for those emergency situations that AER can be of assistance.”
For more information go to home.army.mil/irwin