PENSACOLA, Fla. - Damage Controlman 1st Class Anna Dickin, a Kennewick, WA native, accepted the 2025 Mid-Grade Enlisted Military Instructor of the Year award on Feb. 19 for her work as a U.S. Navy instructor assigned to Surface Warfare Schools Command (SWSC) Engineering Learning Site (ELS) in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.
Dickin was selected by Naval Education and Training Command (NETC) as a top instructor among nearly 7,500 other accomplished individuals serving across the domain, from Navy Boot Camp through the Navy’s advanced training centers and schoolhouses. Dickin received the award at the instructor of the year ceremony Feb. 19 where Rear Adm. Greg Huffman, commander of NETC, spoke on her achievements as a military instructor.
“Our Mid-Grade Instructor of the Year, DC1 Anna Dickin, applies her relentless drive to elevate and motivate everyone around her,” said Huffman. “Whether mentoring Sailors as a firefighting instructor or training for her next marathon, she brings discipline and resilience to every challenge.”
Dickin has various career accomplishments as a Junior Sailor and as an instructor. Previously, Dickin has been named Instructor of the Year at SWSC ELS Pearl Harbor, further showing her passion to channel her success into the future of the fleet. She expresses her pride in this accomplishment by saying “... nothing is more rewarding than knowing the Sailors I mentored are now better equipped to succeed in the fleet because of the standards I helped them set.”
NETC, headquartered at Naval Air Station Pensacola, Florida, is the largest shore command in the U.S. Navy. NETC leads the Navy’s “Street to Fleet” process – recruiting America’s sons and daughters and transforming them through world-class training into highly skilled, battle-ready warfighters. More than 87 percent of new Sailors flow through NETC’s schoolhouses and learning centers once they graduate boot camp – and on any given day, NETC is training 33,000 Sailors at its 251 training sites.