Page 4 - The Cormorant Issue 24 Crest Publications

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Editorial
Lt Col Mark Nolte, Cdr Tom Trent, Wg Cdr Sam Wallington
FROM THE CAREFUL SOCIAL distancing of the induction days through to the final goodbyes in the July sunshine, ACSC 24 has been an incredibly rewarding and incredibly challenging journey. Over 250 students from over 50 countries have come together and worked as a team of teams, making some lifelong friendships in the process.
What highlights can we reflect upon? Some of the outstanding and truly inspiring external speakers. More than 900 Coffee Roulette interactions. Slido upvoting politics. The international garden parties. The tribulations of Exercise ALTEAN DESTINY. And who would have thought that a three-day tour around the UK in place of the overseas trips could have been so valuable?
In putting The Cormorant together this year, it’s been clear that there is no single universal memory for the students or DS. There have been so
many unique intellectual
& personal journeys that no collection of words and images can adequately express the ACSC 24 experience. In the pages that follow you will therefore find a selection of memories that hint at what has taken place.
We thank everyone
who contributed to The Cormorant this year, wittingly or not. And we look forward to seeing you all again soon.
Commandant Foreword
Maj Gen Gen Andrew Roe
FIRST OF ALL, CONGRATULATIONS on completing ACSC 24. Staff College is designed to be a
year that stretches you, both academically and professionally, whilst providing space and time to think, reflect and consider your future. Yours has been the most demanding of courses, due to the substantial challenges that the Covid-19 pandemic brought, and the need for remote learning until Easter. You all adapted to the new delivery means seamlessly and without hesitation. Thank you for your efforts in so doing.
Education and training are very definitely at the heart of ACSC. The successes of the MRes, MA or new MSc are due in no small part to your hard work and endeavours, for which you are to be congratulated
for your commitment and drive. Your experiences will continue to shape and improve this for future cohorts. For the coming years, I am determined to change
the education experience further to make it more relevant to today’s world as it is, not as we wish it to be. The emergence of the IOpC, and corollary focus on MDI, are key tenets for how Defence and partners across Government will operate with us, and you have received innovative training in how to operate in these newest of environments. To maintain our cutting-edge, Joint Professional Military Education
is under review and the findings will substantially enhance how, and what, the course delivers. As a result, these improvements will better prepare our graduates for war, the relentless pace of change and the clear paradigm shift in the nature of conflict. Combined, these enhancements will deliver a cadre of officers that is intellectually agile, dynamic and capable of overcoming the most demanding and ambiguous of operational conditions.
Additionally,
and central to
our ability to
command diverse
organisations, will
be our behaviours.
How we interact
and operate with
our personnel
sets the tone for
the organisations
within which we work. We must ensure that
we harness all of the skills that exist within our organisation by ensuring inclusive leadership. This brings me back to my starting point. From here, you are going out to your organisations as future leaders, in command and senior staff assignments where your actions will have a significant influence on others. Think hard about what sort of officer or civil servant you intend to be. You truly have the opportunity to change your organisations for the better, and I am confident that ACSC and your time at the Defence Academy has set the conditions for you to do so.
Finally, I would encourage you all to keep in touch with one another and with the Defence Academy. The one constant message that I receive from ACSC students is that friendships and networks forged here endure. Across Defence, Government Departments and with our international partners, these, as much as the academic and professional skills you have learnt, will stay with you through your future careers. Let me leave you with a quote from Eric Hoffer, the American moral and social philosopher: “In times of drastic change it is the learners who inherit the future. The learned usually find themselves equipped to live in a world that no longer exists.”