#HumansOfScottAFB: Airman 1st Class Gavin Oddo [Image 3 of 22]

SCOTT AIR FORCE BASE, IL, UNITED STATES

06.18.2019

Photo by Senior Airman Tara Stetler 

375th Air Mobility Wing

“My dad was in my life until he passed away when I was 14. Until then, he really supported me throughout high school. He really inspired me, seeing his progression. He started out running wires in attics, and with that knowledge he was able to study and self-teach his way into becoming a fully-certified electrical engineer just before he died.

I’d been doing okay in high school, but once I lost him I just didn’t care about school anymore. I felt like I didn’t have any motivation to actually do anything. I would just sleep in class, and my teachers knew what had happened, so they would just let me. I didn’t really go to any high school events.

But we had a guidance counselor that I was pretty good friends with, and he was talking about wanting to start a robotics team, so I volunteered to help with that. It started as just a group of seniors and we grabbed a few lower classmen from the engineering class they had. We used a storage site and we kind of reclaimed that and made it into a little workshop. I feel like it got me more engaged in high school because I wasn’t just sitting in class everyday. I was actually figuring out ‘Why doesn’t this work?’ and planning out our next stages and troubleshooting. And then we had to compete in a competition. During that, robots would crash into stuff and break, and you had to fix it really quickly to get into the next round.

I always knew I loved computers, but that really cemented it for me because I enjoy that type of environment where you’re actually using your brain. In the future I’d like to get a ton of certifications and become a certified security professional. I feel like my dad set me up better than he was set up, and I definitely have a better base to build on. He really guided me on the direction I’m going right now.”

- Airman 1st Class Gavin Oddo, 618th Air Communications Squadron C2 systems support technician

#HumansOfScottAFB is an ongoing photo series featuring the stories of people who work, live, and volunteer at Scott Air Force Base.

• Date Taken: 06.18.2019
• Date Posted: 09.16.2019 16:45
• Photo ID: 5754409
• VIRIN: 190618-F-VX890-1004
• Resolution: 5032x3652
• Size: 1.13 MB
• Location: SCOTT AIR FORCE BASE, IL, US