Superintendent prepares cadets, staff for new academic year

  • Published
  • By Don Branum
  • Air Force Academy Public Affairs
U.S. AIR FORCE ACADEMY, Colo. --  Academy Superintendent Lt. Gen. Mike Gould held a series of superintendent's calls Monday and Tuesday in the Arnold Hall Theater here to mentally prepare the Academy's faculty, staff and cadets for the beginning of the 2012-2013 academic year.

Classes began Thursday after what Gould called an eventful summer, capped by the Class of 2016 Acceptance Parade on Tuesday.

"I want to take this opportunity to get us all going in the same direction," Gould said. He showed staff members a diagram outlining the Academy's mission, which is to produce highly trained and educated officers and inspired leaders of character. Strategies listed on the diagram included recruiting quality people, developing a comprehensive curriculum and center of innovation, measuring its institutional competencies and assessing the outcomes of its efforts.

"We have a mission here, and we want to be the best at it," Gould said. "That's where metrics are important. We say we develop highly trained and educated officers, and in our gut we think we do, but metrics will help us prove it. They'll help keep us focused on the reason we're here."

Underlying the Academy's strategy for its mission are principles that will help it get there, including diversity, a culture of respect and inclusion, proper resource security management, a developed and motivated workforce and combat-ready Airmen ready to deploy, Gould said.

The general welcomed several new senior officials: Brig. Gen. Greg Lengyel, who succeeded Brig. Gen. Richard Clark as commandant of cadets; Col. Kabrena Rodda, who assumed command of the Academy Preparatory School; Col. Joseph Rizzuto, who now commands the 306th Flying Training Group; and Chief Master Sgt. Stephen Ludwig, who succeeded now-retired Chief Master Sgt. Todd Salzman.

He also thanked 10th Air Base Wing Airmen for their efforts in containing the Waldo Canyon Fire, which burned more than 18,000 acres west of Colorado Springs before it was contained in early July.

"(Army) Maj. Gen. Joe Anderson, who commands the 4th Infantry Division at Fort Carson, asked, 'What can we do at the 4th ID to help?'" Gould recalled. "'We could have a brigade of Soldiers up here with shovels if you want.' Our fire chief said, 'If you have any heavy equipment, we could use it to create some firebreaks.' Later that afternoon, six flatbeds came rolling up Interstate 25 loaded with heavy equipment."

U.S. Forest Service policy allows forest roads, most of them unpaved, to be widened or improved under specific circumstances. The policies are more relaxed in emergency situations like forest fires, Gould said.

"Well, the engineers came up there with their heavy equipment, and they improved those roads," Gould said, to laughter from the audience.

The general invited 10th Civil Engineer Squadron Fire Chief Ernst Piercy and other firefighters in the theater to stand up and take a bow, which they did to applause from the rest of the audience. He praised the firefighters for fire mitigation efforts in the years before the fire and tipped his hat to the 306th Flying Training Group for coordinating helicopter operations at the Academy Airfield. Finally, he thanked the 10th Security Forces Squadron for preventing any incidents of looting or other criminal activity while the Douglass Valley and Pine Valley housing areas were evacuated.

Gould also thanked Fort Carson for setting up a staging area for Academy evacuees, Colorado College for temporarily hosting summer classes and the Discovery Canyon Campus School for offering its facilities for Basic Cadet Training should they be needed.

Finally, he thanked the staff and volunteers who helped move reception and inprocessing into the Cadet Field House from its normal location in Doolittle Hall.

But while the Academy's families handled the Waldo Canyon Fire admirably, many challenges remain, Gould said. Chief among those challenges are suicides, which are increasing among active-duty Airmen and the total force, illegal drug use and sexual assault.

"As of Aug. 3, we've had 36 active-duty suicides. For the total force, that number is 63. That's up from totals from this time last year of 30 and 57," Gould said. "I don't know what's happening -- nobody does -- but we have to do something about it." He recommended people seek out someone to talk to in person or over the phone if they have thoughts about harming themselves.

The cases of illegal drug use -- particularly cases of spice use -- "really disturbed me," Gould said. "We sent a bunch of cadets home."

Gould said he was also concerned about sexual assault cases: the Sexual Assault Response Coordinator reported 52 cases of assault last year that ranged anywhere from unwanted touching to rape. Former Cadet Stephan Claxton is now serving six months confinement after his court-martial conviction for attempted abusive sexual contact, two counts of wrongful sexual contact and four counts of assault and battery.

"We've got to stop this. We've got to stop it," Gould said. "We've all got to rally around this. We have to make a commitment not to let it happen at our Academy or in our Air Force. We need to make sure we're doing everything we can ... as Air Force team members to keep this stuff from happening."

One task Gould has laid out in the next year is a cross-functional team study on how to prevent the climate from deteriorating into a "total breakdown of institutional control," a term used to describe the failure of former senior officials at Penn State to intervene when they became aware of Jerry Sandusky's crimes against children committed there.

"Let's look at the Academy, learn more about what happened at Penn State so we can make sure it doesn't happen here," he said.

He has also charged the Commandant of Cadets staff to transform the Center for Character and Leadership Development into an Air Force center of excellence, and he has asked the Dean of Faculty's leaders with developing a curriculum for leaders of an Air Force that will not be deployed in either Iraq or Afghanistan when they graduate.