News Search

Etchberger Airman Leadership School wins AMC award

  • Published
  • By Staff Sgt. David Dobrydney
  • 319th Air Base Wing Public Affairs
GRAND FORKS AIR FORCE BASE, N.D. --  When the next batch of budding staff sergeants arrives at the Chief Master Sgt. Richard L. Etchberger Airman Leadership School here, they'll have extra reason to be proud.

The school was recently selected by Air Mobility Command to receive the award for best Enlisted Professional Military Education Team of the Year.

The Etchberger ALS holds six classes per year, each containing 12-24 students. When a senior airman is selected for promotion to staff sergeant, they will attend ALS as a permissive assignment in order to devote their full attention to the curriculum.

Master Sgt. Aaron Holmes, ALS commandant, said the award goes beyond just raw numbers of classes held and students graduated.

"All PME staff are selected because they're excelling, so it's always going to be hyper-competitive," Holmes said. "Typical PME instructors can't sit still, so this was an extremely busy year."

The Etchberger ALS has seen some milestone accomplishments in 2014. In June the schoolhouse was officially named after Chief Etchberger in a ceremony that was attended by members of the late Medal of Honor recipient's family.

The next month the school taught its first satellite class of Air National Guard members at the 119th Wing's facilities in Fargo. The schoolhouse did this with a staff of just three members, two of which were putting in double time in order to clear enough active-duty students to make room for the guardsmen.

Holmes is very impressed by the work senior instructor Tech. Sgt. James Richey Jr. and instructor Staff Sgt. Nataly Hatfield have done.

"Over the past 18 months they've really put a lot of long hours in," said Holmes. "They're always in the classroom."

Richey said that while it's nice to be recognized by higher headquarters, the most rewarding part of being an ALS instructore is seeing 'the light come on' when a student comprehends the lesson and realizes how they can apply it to their job.

"The icing on the cake," Richey added, "is when they come back to see you after they graduate and they want to get your guidance or opinion on how to handle something."