JOINT BASE MCGUIRE-DIX-LAKEHURST INSTRUCTORS TRAVEL TO TEACH 177TH AMXS

Photo By Staff Sgt. Hunter Hires | U.S. Air Force SMSgt. Dean L. Couch, 423rd Maintenance Training Squadron instructor, teaching 177th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron members Aug. 5, 2020, at the 177th Fighter Wing, Egg Harbor Township, N.J. An instructor team from Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst came to the 177th FW to teach their first TDY lesson. (U.S. Air National Guard photo by Airman 1st Class Hunter Hires)  

EGG HARBOR TOWNSHIP, NJ, UNITED STATES

08.20.2020

Story by Airman 1st Class Hunter Hires 

177th Fighter Wing - NJ Air National Guard

ATLANTIC CITY AIR NATIONAL GUARD BASE, NJ. —A team of Active Duty U.S. Air Force instructors from Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst came to the 177th Fighter Wing to teach a wide variety of lessons to members of the 177th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron (AMXS) from August fourth to August eighth.

The class is a conglomeration of lessons and protocols that the Active Duty service members use. The class includes important lessons on personnel scheduling, training, special programs, analysis, techniques, aircraft maintenance management, duties and responsibilities, quality assurance, total force, manpower, aircraft forms documentation, safety and emergency response.

“This class is an AFI requirement, and to my knowledge we haven’t had that training,” said U.S. Air Force Lt. Col. Brian T. Cooper, 177th AMXS Commander. “That’s the surface of why it’s important. The real reason is that the people taking the class aren’t just in supervisor positions; they’re flight chiefs, personnel from back shops and a few other positions from the flight line. Getting that experience outside your wheelhouse really gets you a better appreciation and understanding of what ‘this’ shop’s job does and what ‘that’ shop’s job does, as to better work together.”

Working together has been a very common theme in relevance to this class. The team of instructors consists of MSgt. Maria Carlson, MSgt. Jeremy Lewis, MSgt. Martin Noel and the senior instructor, SMSgt. Dean Couch. They are all members of the 423rd Maintenance Training Squadron at Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst.

“We love coming here,” said Couch. “We’ve been trying to come here since we started the course, because the 177th Fighter Wing is the sixth course we’ve ever taught, and the first mobile course we’ve ever taught. Here, we can see how you operate and be able to learn from you, because you’ve all been doing things really well for a lot of years. Learning how you do things and tailoring it down so that we can teach you how Active Duty does it is a way to bridge the gap between Active Duty and the Guard, and see each other from both sides of the fence.”

These classes aren’t just showing Airmen how the job can be done, but inspiring them to ask how the job can be done better.

“Equipping people with the knowledge and resources that we need to use every day when we’re managing our fleets is really important,” said Carlson. “I also think we offer a collaboration; a collaborative environment where we can learn from each other’s experiences and we could really discuss what should be done versus what is being done,” said Carlson.

However, the 177th Fighter Wing is not the only group of service members benefiting from the teachings of this class. The instructor team from Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst have also had their eyes opened, traveling to educate for the first time.

“This is our first Military Training Team or Temporary Duty Travel to teach, so being that we’re just down the road, stationed at Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, this is an opportunity for us to travel somewhere nearby, within the state,” said Lewis.

Both Active Duty and the Air National Guard can attest to the course being beneficial. Lt. Col. Cooper, 177th AMXS Commander spent over a decade as an Active Duty service member before joining the Air National Guard, presently serving here at the 177th FW.

“I was 11 and a half years Active Duty, and now I’m at six, almost seven years in the Guard,” said Cooper. “I grew up in an Active Duty environment, so the Guard is sometimes very similar. Sometimes we do things a little bit different based off of AFI’s and requirements. At the end of the day, when we go and do our primary mission down range, or we deploy somewhere, we all have to work together on the same page. The team in there are bringing an Active Duty perspective, which is great, but it’s really interesting to have me in there to be a sort of liaison to say, ‘Hey, here’s how we do it’. They would say, ‘Hey, we’re teaching this to all Active Duty supervisors. What do you want them to know about the Guard?’, and so they’ve come out with a lot of knowledge too.”

Knowledge is an important tool that will help us both now and later in regards to the jobs that Airmen carry out all over the world. Knowledge is key to understanding, and understanding is key to improvement.

• Date Taken: 08.20.2020
• Date Posted: 08.23.2020 12:15
• Story ID: 376449
• Location: EGG HARBOR TOWNSHIP, NJ, US