Army Mentorship Training at Defense Information School

Yet another post about Army life at DINFOS.

Each Thursday at DINFOS the Army received mentorship training.  This program adds a full hour of dull PowerPoint presentations to a day that started at 0400.  Like every other program here, we are supposed to be awake and attentive.  Yet nearly all the information  in mentorship is for active duty Army. 

A colonel who spoke to us said 35 minutes into  a presentation that ran ten minutes overtime that guard and reserve should go to sleep, this info is for active Army.  Yet all MOS-Ts are required to be there to listen to information that does not apply to them when they could be studying, eating or resting.

In fairness, the mentorship program would not be as painfully bad as it is if it were not combined with the 0400 PT Program.  But it is.  Mentorship is the 13^th hour in a day that is already too long.

Whoever dreamed up this program probably thought it was a good thing.  But that is how every failed product launch happens in the business world.  Someone inside the company dreams up a new product or service then decides to sell it without asking real customers.

The real customers in this case want to do their homework, sleep, or just about anything rather than sit through another hour of PowerPoint.

If you need specifics, I wrote at length about mentorship training here, I wrote about it last month.

The post is below.

Saturday, October 5, 2013

Another Reason the Air Force Laughs at us: Thursday Mentorship Training

Among the many ill-conceived programs we endure at school, the Thursday mentorship program for Army soldiers is one of the dumbest.

Each Thursday at 4:30 p.m. we gather in a conference room of the main school building and listen to a one-hour lecture about what our job will be like out in the field.  At least, that is how the lecture is billed.

In reality, exactly one of the lectures had any real connection to our immediate future in Army Public Affairs.  But these lectures do have an effect on our school experience.

They are one more ill-conceived and unnecessary aggravation. 

We get up at 4 a.m. each morning to do PT (Physical Training) and have eight hours of classes each day finishing at 4 p.m.   Adding a lecture that will not be graded at the end of a 12-hour day would be nasty if it were interesting.  But these lectures are farther off topic than cold-weather survival training in Mogadishu, Somalia.

With one exception, these lectures are far above our pay grade, and focused on active-duty Army.  The majority of the soldiers in these classes are enlisted and junior NCOs in the National Guard and Reserve.

Four weeks ago, a Sergeant First Class talked to us for 73 minutes about the distribution of Public Affairs leadership slots in the active Army.  His focus was on officers and senior NCOs.  And he droned on 13 minutes over his hour in front of people who had already spent a whole day in class.

Two weeks ago, a Master Sergeant spoke for his entire hour about creating PowerPoint slides for command briefings.  He is a perfect example of the kind of speaker that drives speechwriters crazy:  he thinks he is funny, and he is not.  Worse still, he thinks he is funny when he is just being himself.  He said toward the end of the hour, “I know this stuff is dry, but at least I am entertaining right?”

He got a mildly affirmative answer, but what else could he get.  He has power over his audience and was using it to make himself feel good. 

To be fair, there was one useful mentoring hour.  It lasted just 45 minutes.  A Staff Sergeant who works on the Army’s social media program talked to us about how the Army is currently using social media and where the program is headed.

That talk was useful.  We got one ungraded day in our entire three-month school program about social media, and most of us will return to units who have or need Facebook page administrators. 

By the end of school we will have had 12 hours of mentorship, 12 hours mostly spent trying to stay awake listening to irrelevant information. 

Army Strong! 

Army Fitness Training at DINFOS--Making Sure the Best Soldiers are Less Fit

We are told by the school upon arriving that DINFOS is one of the toughest academic schools in the military.  Unlike most military schools it has homework and it demands creativity.

It is clear from my conversations with former students, that PT every day for returning students is not required, it is a decision by the student company leadership.

We come to school with PT records, and a soldier should be able to take a diagnostic AFPT any time.  There is no reason to take soldiers who regularly score in PT Award range and put them on a 5-day-per-week program designed to get soldiers in good enough shape to simply pass the APFT. 

Getting up at 0400 is an arbitrary and miserable hardship that should be reserved for those who are marginal or failing the APFT.  The best soldiers are athletes.  They train like athletes.  Putting an athlete on a 5-day remedial program is like putting a New York Times editor through remedial English classes.

Athletes also train seven days a week, even if one of the days is a rest day.  Yet the detachment PT program runs five consecutive then leaves the weekends alone.  This leaves the soldiers with a real training program balancing study, sleep and workouts on the two days off. 

If the detachment actually wanted successful students and soldiers who could pass the AFPT, we would work out three days during the week and put longer workouts on the weekend. 

This is how we managed pre-deployment PT at Fort Sill.  Of course, detachment personnel do not want to work seven days a week, but by cramming the PT program into five straight days, they increase the likelihood that soldiers will fail both academically at DINFOS and at PT.  I have spoken to several soldiers whose PT performance degraded over time with the detachment.

The best example of how bad the program is for fit soldiers is student leader, a staff sergeant in the Connecticut National Guard.  He is running a marathon 12 days after graduation from DINFOS.  He has been doing his long training runs on Wednesdays after class.  On October 30, he was the fast runner in the company in the fitness at 12:34.  That evening he ran 20 miles.  I saw him running back on post after dark.  The next morning he did the two-mile Zombie run.

Why put him through a program for people who spent their lives playing video games?  He scores 300 on the APFT.  He will run the marathon well under four hours.  He had to adjust his marathon training and his school work around a PT program that gave him nothing back and took away ten hours sleep a week.

Highlights from Army School

For the next few days I will be posting things I included in the student evaluation I did at the end of my school at DINFOS.
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My interaction with SFC Wilkerson, 1800 hours, 29 Oct 13:

After class the evening before the APFT, I rode my bicycle.  As I was passing post headquarters, I noticed that the northwest corner of the APFT run course was blocked with temporary fencing and cones.  People running on the course were hopping over a ditch.

I then rode to the orderly room to let the cadre know about the blocked run course.  When I entered SFC Wilkerson was leaning on the duty driver’s desk.  I asked him if SFC Bennett was here. 

He said, “No he isn’t.  What do you want.”

I told him about the run course.

He said, “That’s a small thing.  Someone should already have checked the course.”

He then straightened up and looked me in the eye.  Did he think I was telling him a lie?

He then said,  “I’ll let the first sergeant know.”  He turned his back to me and walked toward the first sergeant’s office.

At 2221 hours that night I got a message saying the location of the APFT had been moved. 

The next morning SFC Wilkerson said nothing to me.

I bring this up because SFC Wilkerson and I are both sergeants.  When I came with what turned out to be useful information, he never addressed me by name nor said anything remotely resembling thank you.  Quite the opposite.  Is there some reason that a member of the cadre has to address a 60-year-old sergeant who is off duty with no respect whatever, not even use his name? 

I don’t think so.  If the disrespect ran the reverse direction, I am sure there would be Hell to pay.  We may be students, but many of us are also NCOs.  Away from formation there is no reason I can see to students who disrespectfully, especially students who are NCOs.

Student Company Screws with Soldiers on the Final Day at Fort Meade

Today began like every day, with my alarm going off at 4:10 a.m.  But this was my last day of school with no official duties except out processing and graduation.

At 4:50 a.m. we were in formation.  When the rest of company formed up for PT, we moved to the back of the formation and were dismissed.  Out processing did not open until 7:30 a.m. We got up, went to formation, stood for 15 minutes and were dismissed.  Why did we get up?  Only the student company leadership could explain that.

At Noon we went to the graduation room at the DINFOS building.  The ceremony started at 1:25 p.m. but we arrived at noon for award ceremonies for three of the four services represented in our 17-person class.  Graduation was a class A dress uniform ceremony and the Army was the majority, with nine of the 17 graduates.  We had no ceremony.

The six Air Force graduates got pinned with their skill badge.  They had a half-dozen Air Force cadre looking on.  The lone Coast Guardsman got promoted and got his skill rating.  He had most of the Coast Guard cadre up front for his ceremony.  The lone Marine had a member of his cadre there and the Marine in our class is staying at Fort Meade for an advanced school.

No one from the Army was scheduled to be there.  One of the civilian instructors said the Army was just the crowd to applaud for the other services.  Then a few minutes before the ceremony, the Army detachment First Sergeant showed up in camouflage uniform.  My first thought was, 'Imagine how the he would have exploded if one of us showed up for a class A formation in camo!"

He said he was busy.  I am sure that would have excused any of us, NOT!  

Then he hurriedly handed out two awards.  One was a certificate to our class leader.  While handing Ben Simon the certificate, the 1st Sgt. mentioned Ben had scored 312 on the fitness test. Then the 1st Sgt. gave a coin to Ken Edel for running the Army Ten Miler.  We all looked at each other with the WTF look we often share about the Student Company.  Sitting next to Ben were two more soldiers who got PT Awards.  In fact the three soldiers in that room with PT awards were the top scorers among more than 100 soldiers in the student company.  Also, with Ben and Ken up front, the 1st Sgt. called up two of the three student leaders in our group.  The third, Grace Pak, was also a squad leader.  And was not mentioned.

Then the 1st Sgt. left.  We had the ceremony.  Our company commander showed up to shake our hands at the end of the ceremony.  He was also wearing camouflage.  Our commander is a very long winded public speaker.  He once spoke to us at considerable length about the Army value Respect.  Hard to forget that when he also shows up to a class A formation in utility uniform.

With certificates in hand, we went back to the student detachment to sign out.  The commander and 1st Sgt. had both been to the ceremony and had to know it would be over at about 2:15 p.m.  Several soldiers had flights to catch.  The three of us who arrived first began to process out then found out we could not.

The entire student company cadre had a 2:30 p.m. meeting that would last an hour.  No, they could not be interrupted for out processing.  Why would they schedule a meeting just when the students were arriving to sign out?  

I thanked God that I did not have a plane to catch and left.  Thinking there would be more screw ups and knowing that I could not beat the traffic out of Baltimore, I rode my bike for two hours.  I came back at five and still had to wait for paperwork.  Eventually, our platoon sergeant took my email and said my final papers would be sent to me.  

When I left, Chris Perkey was still waiting for a leave form.  He is active duty and needs the paperwork in his hand.  

Good bye student company.  I won't miss you.  

That's Not the REAL Words to those Marching Songs!!!

On Monday this week we marched to the gym for our morning workout.  We formed up at 4:50 a.m. and returned at 6 a.m., so we marched both ways in the dark.

On the way to the gym, SFC Wilkerson sang the marching songs.  On the way back it was SFC Bennett.  They are as different as two men with the same training and the same job can be.  Wilkerson yells, Bennett can sing.  Marching a mile with Wilkerson is dull.  With Bennett calling cadence I feel like I could march to Baltimore from Fort Meade.

But it struck me this morning much more than in the last three months just how completely neutered our marching songs are.  When I joined the Air Force in 1972 and when I re-enlisted as a tank crewman in the Army in 1975, I marched to songs that sounded like young warriors were singing.

In the 1972 we marched to songs about killing Viet Cong, and crushing North Viet Nam.  One particularly nasty song had the refrain "Napalm sticks to kids."  And the sexist songs were so over the top as to be ludicrous even to the 19-year-olds singing them.  One of our drill sergeants could sing more than 20 verses of a song that began:

"I wish all the ladies, was bats in a steeple,
and I was the big bat, there'd be more bats than people,
Hey Hey Babareebo. . ."

But no road march was complete without Jody.  One of the generic names for marching songs is Jody Calls.

Jody Calls tell the story of a guy named Jody back home who is sleeping with your wife/lover, driving your car, living in your house, emptying your bank account, and hunting with your dog.  We always sang songs about this lecherous lothario with the refrain "Jody's got your girl and gone. . ."

And we slammed our heels to the ground when we swore.

But here at Fort Meade, the songs are clean, they are not sexist, they are only occasionally violent.  These were the songs we sang on the last day of basic when parents came to visit. 

If you have never heard the real songs, watch the beginning of the movie "Jarhead."  My daughter Lisa watched Jarhead with her friends when she was in high school.  She came home and said, "Dad, you never told us the real words."  She also asked about the bulletin board in the tent called the Jody Board.

I told her who Jody was and that the Jody Board was where you put up pictures of the woman that just dumped you.

Lisa explain the Jody Board to her friends.  They all went back and saw the movie again. 

I miss the songs with sex, death, and enemies.  Even with Bennett singing, compared to the old days, I feel like I am marching with a scout troop.

Be Careful Playing Age Card

On Friday morning last week we had a company formation run.

These runs suck.  Nearly 100 soldiers run two miles at a pace we can stay together.  That usually means 11-minute miles and trying to keeping from tripping over the soldier in front of me.

Before this company run a drug and alcohol counselor led us in rah-rah anti-drug cheers.  When he said Army, we said, Drug Free.

Then he said he was going to run with us and call some special cadence.  He did, for a few hundred yards, then sergeants from our unit took over, then he called for a few minutes near the end.  The run took 26 minutes:  13-minute miles!!

When we were back on the parade field, the drug counselor led us in a few more cheers.  His jacket was off.   He was sweating.  This painfully slow run was clearly a big effort for him.

Then he said to all of us, "I'm 60 years old and I can still do this!"  I was in the back row of the formation.  There was some laughter around me.  He didn't know there was a 60-year-old in the formation who  runs two miles at a 7:30 pace. 

I am very careful not to say I am good for my age.  There is always somebody better.

Faith in the Army, Part 3: Bigger World, Smaller Christian World

"To define is to limit," said Oscar Wilde.  In this self-examination of faith I started a few days ago I realized that another vast difference between Sgt. Gussman the new believer in 1974 and Sgt. Gussman in 2007 when I re-enlisted is three college degrees and much personal experience of many facets of the Church in this world.

In one of his best books on the faith, C.S. Lewis wrote about the "Mere Christianity" we all share if we are Christian believers.  Thirty-five years of reading and re-reading C.S. Lewis' 39 books and many hundreds more have left me much more aware, sad to say, of everything that is not mere Christianity.  The stuff we don't share looms large in my mind.

As a new believer, I wondered about different denominations of the Protestant Church, different faiths, different versions of the Bible, different ways of communicating the faith, and spiritual disciplines.  I tried lots of them.  I listened to James Robinson preach in stadiums in Texas and Oklahoma on cassette tapes.  I listened Bob Mumford and Derek Prince teach about the ministry of the Holy Spirit.  I read Sword of Lord newspaper out of Murfreesboro, Tennessee.  I went to the Gospel Service in the base chapel where the training NCO in our Armor Battalion was the lay preacher.

I fasted for up to three days.  I prayed.  I meditated.  I tried everything.  

Then I left active duty, went to college, and started to learn about literature, science, languages, the whole vast world of the mind that I had very little inkling of in high school.  

I learned Greek, I read the Russian greats: Gogol, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, and Chekov.  I fell in love with Dante's Divine Comedy.  Politics went from opaque to entertaining after I read Machiavelli.  

I learned relatively little science.  I wanted to be a writer and took mostly literature courses.  But I learned what may be the most important word when science and religion are discussed together: Contingency.  Science was not sent down Mount Sinai on stone tablets.  Science changes.  Often.

In fact, the best path to fame in science is to take on the biggest theory in science and change, improve, modify, or overturn it.  Einstein corrected Newton.  Someday someone may do the same to Einstein.  In any case, the current theories of science are the best description of reality in their respective fields:  Evolution, Quantum Electrodynamics, Universal Gravitation and others are the best description of reality that millions of working scientists can come up with.

All this exciting new knowledge had the effect of limiting my Christian world.  I knew Christian Television was a non-sequitor even before Neil Postman explained why in "Amusing Ourselves to Death."  Because I knew and loved the ministry of Kanaan in Germany where Cliff lived, the Prosperity Gospel looked both ridiculous and heretical.  

End Times obsession combined with Creation Science in my mind as the playground where you can take the Bible literally at no personal cost.  Taking the words of Jesus literally could lead to giving away all your money to the poor, preaching without pay, going on a mission trip with nothing but a bowl and a staff and other things no literalist takes literally.

So there I am, trimming away fellowship with vast swaths of the Church in this world.  In my current Church, my family is one of the three token Democrat families among 300 Conservatives. So even where I belong, I don't completely.  

And there is more.