10th Army Air and Missile Defense Command Soldier Helps at the Garrison

Photo By Spc. Jasmin Flores | Sgt. Robert Baddeley, a patriot system repair Soldier with Service Company, 5th Battalion, 7th Air Defense Artillery Regiment, works at his desk at the U.S. Army Garrison Rheinland-Pfalz Public Affairs Office. Baddeley has spent the last 12 weeks using his civilian skills to save the Army a lot of money by developing a new website to help fellow Soldiers and their families.  

RHINE ORDNANCE BARRACKS, RP, GERMANY

06.18.2015

Story by Spc. Jasmin Flores 

10th Army Air and Missile Defense Command

RHINE ORDNANCE BARRACKS, Germany — Like most Soldiers, Sgt. Robert Baddeley’s day starts around 6 a.m. for morning physical training, and ends around 5. How he spends the hours in between separates him from other Soldiers.

Baddeley, a patriot system repair Soldier with Service Company, 5th Battalion, 7th Air Defense Artillery Regiment, spent the last 12 weeks using his civilian skills to save the Army a lot of money by developing a new website to help fellow Soldiers and their families.

Prior to joining the Army, Baddeley worked at a web page design firm in his native California as a web design programmer for five years. There he learned the basics of back end coding as well as design and coding and turned his very serious hobby into a valuable skill.

In April 2014, the U.S. Army Garrison Rheinland-Pfalz Public Affairs Office recruited Baddeley through a Facebook community wide request. He volunteered his expertise to help revamp their website.

“He's gone above and beyond here at the garrison,” said Rick Scavetta, garrison public affairs officer who’s worked alongside Baddeley. “He created an amazing newcomer's page to help our sponsorship efforts, and designed an entirely new and dynamic garrison website from scratch, as well as a community resource guide for the 21st Theater Sustainment Command.”

Baddeley creates code templates line by line using a “bootstrap frame work,” a term known mostly to computer programmers, to allow him to use the same elements on every page without having to rewrite each and every one. His daily schedule revolves around creating documentation, bug checking, and checking the spelling of the many pages he has created.

Since March, Baddeley has been working to rebuild the Rheinland-Pfalz website to make it both friendly for desktops and mobile platforms. He has spent more than 400 hours making an original design based on the guidance of the garrison leaders. He regularly meets with them to ensure satisfaction and efficiency on the many sites. He has even integrated a German translation for certain sites.

“I do it because web development can be really expensive; it can easily cost $125 per hour and sometimes more,” Baddeley said. “It makes more sense to save money by finding someone in house.”

Along with working at the garrison, Baddeley juggles his time with his work as his unit’s operations noncommissioned officer in charge. He is able to stay in the loop and take care of his Soldiers, write memorandums, recommend awards, and provide general oversight of actions being processed in his unit. He’s also married and recently became a father.

As Baddeley prepares to leave Germany, for a permanent change of duty station to Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, Texas, his work and efforts at the garrison will continue to help the many Soldiers stationed in the Kaiserslautern Military Community as well as the future Soldiers to come.

“His efforts will help hundreds of local Soldiers and their families now, and thousands in the months and years to come,” Scavetta said. “He is an outstanding web developer and we're glad to have found him among the ranks of the 10th AAMDC.”

• Date Taken: 06.18.2015
• Date Posted: 06.18.2015 05:10
• Story ID: 167071
• Location: RHINE ORDNANCE BARRACKS, RP, DE