Here recently, Cadet Gruening has challenged the members of the wing via email to look back on there first days as an AFROTC cadet in effort to develop a background for the pending new student orientation program (NSOP). This program would be used as a guide to help Cadets learn the ropes of being a cadet in AFROTC. For some, the distance of time may have stored those memories away with a lesser amount of clarity; however, for me (freshmen, IMT) it was just last semester and my memory has yet to dissolve the finer details.
I remember the barbecue we had for the parents and the new students, it was a brief hour or two of running back and forth between time with our parents and being briefed through power point on the rules and regulations. It was a lot to take in at the time, I wasn’t really sure how I was going to lock all this information into my brain. About a week or two (and a few hair cuts for the boys) later, the opportunity to wear my uniform for the first time presented itself; it just so happened a three star and a one star general were visiting the wing for the first time in a few years (which is not intimidating at all…).
I live in an ROTC learning community and luckily happened to make friends with a few Marine Options out of the NROTC detachment who taught me how to shine my shoes. Once that was taken care of, I proceeded to suck the life out of the few upper level Air Force cadets on my floor using questions on how to get my uniform ready. The several responses I received went something to the tune of “The UOD is service dress, so wear your LSB’s and your tie tab, and don’t forget to IP your uniform.” My initial thought: can I get some English please? After my brief phase of feeling pity for Webster and the act of turning his elaborately organized language into a series of acronyms, I did what was needed and ultimately made it through that Saturday morning without making a complete fool of myself.
I live in an ROTC learning community and luckily happened to make friends with a few Marine Options out of the NROTC detachment who taught me how to shine my shoes. Once that was taken care of, I proceeded to suck the life out of the few upper level Air Force cadets on my floor using questions on how to get my uniform ready. The several responses I received went something to the tune of “The UOD is service dress, so wear your LSB’s and your tie tab, and don’t forget to IP your uniform.” My initial thought: can I get some English please? After my brief phase of feeling pity for Webster and the act of turning his elaborately organized language into a series of acronyms, I did what was needed and ultimately made it through that Saturday morning without making a complete fool of myself.
With time, each and every one of these tasks became easier and easier to maintain, handle, and execute. However, the moral of the story is, I feel that a new student orientation program would be highly beneficial to the wing and it’s incoming cadets. It would most definitely eliminate some of the initial distress associated with these simple tasks and take a little bit off the edge of confusion for the future IMT. Through this program I feel that cadets will have more of an understanding of what ROTC entails and what is required of them as a Future Officer of the United States Air Force.
Cadet First Class Meaghan Crandell
