Photo By Senior Airman Geneva Nguyen | U.S. Air Force 2nd Lt. Alexandra R. Roque, vehicle maintenance flight commander of the...... read more read more
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JOINT BASE ANACOSTIA-BOLLING, Washington, D.C. — The clock ticked beneath the fluorescent lights of a medical office as a U.S. Air Force staff sergeant sat anxiously waiting. It was the same feeling experienced by every Officer Training School applicant on this specific Friday.
She remembered seeing a post on social media announcing the OTS acceptance list release earlier that morning.
“My heart was beating so fast I felt like I was going to pass out,” said now-2nd Lt. Alexandra Roque, vehicle maintenance flight commander of the 11th Logistics Readiness Squadron. “Then I heard my name being called over the intercom to come to the commander’s office.”
Only three weeks prior, Roque learned the Air Force would hold a last-minute supplemental OTS board to fill additional manning needs. She had to assemble her application package in a hurry. With the support of her medical squadron of about 70 Airmen and leadership who actively mentored her, she met the deadline.
When her commander announced her as an OTS selectee, the moment took a second to register. She was so flustered she forgot to provide the customary salute.
“It still haunts me,” said Roque, laughing. “I was shaking the whole time.”
Roque was the only selectee at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Wash., in August 2024.
The first call she made wasn’t to her husband but to her mother.
“She didn’t even graduate high school,” Roque said. “She had me at 16 and wanted me to do well in life so she was very happy when she heard the news.”
The achievement was significant, but it was the result of a longer journey, one that started with a hunger for something more.
Roque joined the Air Force in 2015 with a practical goal: education. Raised in a small town with little military presence, she saw the service as an opportunity to leave home, attend college and build a future.
By the time she was 18, newly arrived at Joint Base San Antonio-Fort Sam Houston, Texas, the Air Force felt abstract.
Starting out in the Air Force, Roque worked long shifts as an aerospace medical technician in inpatient pediatrics at Brooke Army Medical Center, a Level I trauma center and one of the military’s largest hospitals. She helped care for hospitalized children at BAMC for three years.
The job exposed her early to high-stakes care and emotional strain.
“We saw a lot of service members with young children that had very aggressive cancers,” she said. “A lot of the children passed away shortly after diagnosis. That was hard (to see), especially at 18.”
For Roque, medical was just a logical choice because it was a career field she could use both in and out of the military.
“I had a hard time correlating what my job did for the Air Force,” she added. “You’re taking care of kids but you don’t always see how that impacts the force.”
Her enlisted career didn’t begin with standout evaluations or awards. She described her early years as marked by a narrow focus on doing the job and not necessarily going beyond it.
“I adapted a negative attitude I saw around me,” she said. “I did my job well, but I didn’t care about volunteering or networking outside my section.”
However, that all changed after she assumed a leadership position.
Roque became the noncommissioned officer in charge of JBLM’s operational medical clinic in 2020 after retraining into flight medicine. There, she oversaw deployment screenings, managed medical readiness and processed waivers for the installation in support of aircrews.
Understanding how enlisted performance briefs, promotion boards and commissioning packages worked opened Roque’s eyes to the importance of engagement outside of her specific duty assignment.
Roque volunteered extensively, took on leadership roles in booster clubs and base organizations and doubled down on education. In addition to earning a bachelor’s degree in health care administration, she earned two master’s degrees, one in business administration and another in leadership and management.
“Getting an education was the whole goal of joining the Air Force in the first place,” she said. “Because my EPBs (Enlisted Performance Briefs) weren’t so great, I also had to make sure I was competitive with my educational achievements.”
Coming from a family where only a few relatives had completed high school, two master’s degrees and a commission also represented something larger than a career milestone for Roque.
Roque also discovered something else which guided her future in the Air Force.
“After reviewing medical records across the base, I saw how many people in the Air Force struggle with mental health,” Roque said. “If your members aren’t doing well mentally, your unit isn’t going to be effective.”
This reality set the core objective for Roque as a logistics readiness officer.
Within months of arriving at Joint Base Anacostia-Bolling in 2025 as a newly minted lieutenant, she was already helping Airmen navigate mental health challenges by connecting them with chaplains, Military OneSource and medical care. Her prior-enlisted background, coupled with medical experience, helped her connect with her enlisted Airmen and understand situations from their perspective.
“I’ve been in long enough to help people avoid the mistakes I made,” she said. “That’s the most important part to me.”
As Roque transitioned from medical to logistics, she faced a steep learning curve. Currently, she oversees sections ranging from vehicle maintenance and fuels to supply and transportation, which are fields far removed from pediatrics or flight medicine.
“As enlisted, you’re the subject matter expert,” she said. “Here, I don’t know how to do maintenance. I can’t just grab a wrench and fix things myself.”
Instead, she shows up. She spends time on the shop floor, learns equipment names, helps where she can and focuses on removing administrative barriers for her team.
“Sometimes the civilians will say, ‘I’ve never seen a flight commander come down here and work with us,’” she said. “They would say, ‘I like your style.’”
Now, the prior-enlisted Airman brings 10 years of medical experience, and leadership lessons learned the hard way into her first assignment as an officer. Whether it’s guiding Airmen through assignments, deployments or simply explaining how the Air Force works, Roque is committed to giving others the same guidance and support that once shaped her own path.
| Date Taken: | 02.10.2026 |
| Date Posted: | 02.10.2026 14:33 |
| Story ID: | 557857 |
| Location: | JOINT BASE ANACOSTIA-BOLLING, DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, US |
| Web Views: | 93 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, Medical to Logistics: Air Force lieutenant brings enlisted perspective forward, by SrA Geneva Nguyen, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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