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For Colorado National Guard Sgt. 1st Class Cindy Littlefeather, Colorado Medical Detachment noncommissioned officer in charge of the troop medical clinic, it is a moment that she was not able to attend because she was deployed in support of Exercise BEYOND THE HORIZON 2016 GUATEMALA.
Her absence from graduating among classmates and family was deemed unacceptable by fellow Soldier Colorado National Guard Sgt. Edward Prosser, 928th Area Support Medical Company health care specialist.
“Just because she isn’t able to go to her graduation ceremony in the states, doesn’t mean we can’t make her one out here,” said Prosser.
The officially unofficial graduation ceremony held May 1, 2016 inside the chow hall gave Littlefeather an emotional swell of achievement despite not walking side-by-side with their classmates.
Littlefeather earned her bachelor’s in human resource management from Ashford University.
“I earned my degree because I want to progress in my National Guard career and I hope to put in a package for warrant officer school,” said Littlefeather.
Prosser took the opportunity to surprise Littlefeather by having a special academic hat, diploma, and cake made to bring the ceremony to life and show her how much it means to pursue education while in the military.
“Anytime someone has a significant accomplishment in their life it’s normal for family to be there to celebrate with them, and since she wasn’t able to have family around, then we took the initiative to fill that role,” said Prosser. “It’s good for everyone’s morale to not only celebrate her accomplishment, but inspire others to do the same.”
Littlefeather was not informed of the ceremony ahead of time. However, Immediately after setting foot in the chow hall, she was greeted by a crowd of Soldiers and Airmen that showed up to show their support for her.
“I was really surprised and happy that they took the time to put it all together,” said Littlefeather. “Everyone taking the time to make all of this happen really means a lot to me. I was happy that they surprised me with an academic hat a cake and a degree that I could physically hold. It really made it the experience that much more real.”
Her hand-crafted academic hat certainly looked the part, and it took some time to have one made just for the ceremony. Colorado National Guard Staff Sgt. Troy Powell, Colorado Medical Detachment NCO in charge of aviation medicine, found the time to ask around and with the help of some Guatemalan nationals had the academic hat created just for her ceremony.
In addition to the hat, Prosser decided that he would enlist the help of some Soldiers to have a cake made for the celebration.
“I figured that this graduation needed to have a cake, so I talked to our kitchen staff and they seemed just as excited as me to help out,” said Prosser. “They made some icing and decorated the cake to help make the moment more special.”
The cake and hat were large parts of the event, but no graduation would be complete without a diploma.
“I spent some time making a diploma that looked almost real,” said Colorado National Guard Spc. Michael Brackett, 928th ASMC health care specialist. “When something like this comes up, you don’t need to be told to do anything, you just want to do it because you know how much it means.”
The bond between service members is not just that of coworkers. These Soldiers are a family and they stick together through the good and the bad times.
| Date Taken: | 05.02.2016 |
| Date Posted: | 05.04.2016 09:37 |
| Story ID: | 197244 |
| Location: | COATEPEQUE, GT |
| Web Views: | 26 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, The graduation that was much more, by 2nd Lt. Dillon Davis, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
