 What is happening today is we have a three-day field training for soldiers here in the NCO Academy. Yesterday soldiers were assessed for conduct individual training. In addition to teaching a class, we also assessed them on how they teach that task to standard. Today we have our leader stakes where there are 12 stations in the academy where students rotate to perform the tasks that they taught yesterday. Under our leader stakes, we move on to our squad stakes where all students and all squads are expected to apply everything that they learned from yesterday and during leader stakes. It was honestly really tough, you know, thick brush and a lot of decisions out of making map movements and a lot of like pauses, going into making sure everybody's good and counted for, taking a casualty move into the LZ. It was a lot of work, you know, like, but it was really good at the same time. It was really fun. But it like built a really big team camaraderie at the same time, big squad camaraderie. The overall mission of the NCOA is to be able to develop discipline and confidence within these young leaders so that they can be able to go back to their units and develop a cohesive team within their units to be able to operate in the operational environment that we're currently in. We're always making sure that they're conducting PRT the right way, the recovery drills, preparation drills, MMD1s and 2s, hip stability, shoulder stability, and just to build that cohesion. We like to do some competition just to build them around and get them going. We found out that the students, they really do enjoy that. Classroom setting, you have that one-on-one with the student. We have 20 students per classroom. We have two instructors in the classrooms at all times. So we make sure we have that one-on-one with the students and they're able to come to us at any point during the day and even in the evening if they ask us to stay late with them to help them out. There's just no better way than that first hand one-on-one with the students. We would like the public to know that we are here at the Academy to again instill discipline in these soldiers, to get them right, to get them their mind functioning and go back to their units with maybe some of the things that they have lost while they were there. For example, communication, effective listening, it's things that they have been doing already. They just didn't know that there was a name to what they were doing or some sort of model. So we want to get them prepared to go back out there and then we are also here with a good group of instructors, top instructors here in Bavaria that had come over here to be able again to teach these young soldiers and get them ready for the future. Okay, so our name is Staff Sergeant Dimas De Leon, D-I-M-A-S-D-E-L-E-O-N. I am in 2nd platoon, Alpha Company at the 7th Army NCO Academy. So I am an instructor. Right now I'm acting senior SGL for 2nd platoon, but yes, instructor overall. So my role here at the NCOA is to be able to develop mentor, coach and teach the future NCOs of the Army and to be able to take back to their units what they learned here as far as being able to be a leader and still discipline within the soldiers back at their units. So what is the overall mission of the NCOA in your words? The overall mission of the NCOA is to be able to develop discipline and confidence within these young leaders so that they can be able to go back to their units and develop a cohesive team within their units to be able to operate in the operational environment that we are currently in. So a couple of the classes that we teach here that we would like for them to take back to the units is effective listening and also communicating. Based on conversation with the students here, back in the units, common denominator is lack of communication. So we give them these tools, tips and tricks on how to effectively communicate with their juniors plus their seniors and their peers as well so that we don't play that telephone game as we all know that we have played in the Army. That way we can be able to accomplish submission that we are given. So a leader or an NCO should be a person that actually cares for their soldiers not just goes to work and when they go home they just leave work at work. That's not how it works in our business and that being in the Army. So you just pretty much have to be in your soldier's lives in and out of uniform, get to know their family as well so they can understand where they come from, what they go through and just to be a person. Treat them like a soldier, treat them like an adult. That way they can be able to function in what we do every single day. So first foremost I have to be knowledgeable in what I talk about. I have to set an example as well. I do spend 22 days with them many, many hours a day not just eight hours and again I have to set the example for them so I have to act the part, look the part, play the part, coach, mentor them, actually dig in the regulations before I even talk to them about anything because you know like I said set the example and show them how it's supposed to be done. So my favorite moment or part of the cycle actually is day zero when they first get here. They get here, they do hide and wait. We conduct the administrative portions but that's where we also lay down the rules, guidelines, go through the barracks, SOP, go through the classroom expectations and get them away from bad habits from their units and actually like I said set the ground rules and it really pretty much sets the tone for the rest of the cycle. Why is that your favorite moment? It just is because we have people that come from different types of MOS, different walks of life. I am combat arms myself so I don't really deal a lot with non-combat arms until I got here. So the mentality is different and they're part of the world if you will. So getting everybody on the same page regardless of what we do in the Army is key especially here at the NCOA. So I believe the core beliefs here at the NCOA is to, the main one is discipline. Like I said we come from all walks of life, different units. When we come here it's one standard across board and it begins with classroom expectations, moves on to the barracks, make sure the barracks are maintained because we want to get them ready for when they go back to their units and they have soldiers under them if they don't already. They will also have to be conducting those barracks inspections and holding them to a standard. So we need to hold these future NCOs to a standard so that they can do that as well when they go back to their units. So discipline is key here at the NCOA. Okay so we would like the public to know that we are here at the Academy to again instill discipline in these soldiers to get them right, to get them their mind functioning and go back to their units with maybe some of the things that they have lost while they were there. For example communication, effective listening. It's things that they have been doing already. They just didn't know that there was a name to what they were doing or some sort of model. So we want to get them prepared to go back out there again and we are also here with a good group of instructors, top instructors here in Bavaria that had come over here to be able again to teach these young soldiers and get them ready for the future. Yeah so during PRT we found out coming off of COVID a lot of students not necessarily now but when we started coming back from COVID PRT was we were lacking in PRT in the units obviously because of the virus. But we're getting back into PRT, getting back to the cohesion and it's not just conducting PRT. It's conducting PRT the correct way. Even after they're done with their assessments that doesn't mean that they're done doing the right thing. So we're always making sure that they're conducting PRT the right way. The recovery drills, preparation drills, MMD ones and twos, hip stability, short stability. And it's just to build that cohesion and what we do here as you saw this morning was we like to do some competition just to build them around and get them going. We found out that the students they really do enjoy that. So the classroom setting here I was fortunate to do both which was virtual and classroom setting. Virtual versus classroom setting there's no comparison. Classroom setting you have that one-on-one with the with the student. We have 20 students per classroom. We have two instructors in the classrooms at all times. So we make sure we have that one-on-one with the students and they're able to come to us at any point during the day and even if the evening if they ask us to stay to stay late with them to help them out. There's just no no better way than that first-hand one-on-one with the students. So classroom setting is is great. I did my blood sweep. You'll notice when I'm blood sweeping, you know, put it on there. You should wrap around it. I'm Staff Sergeant Aragon Justin, A-R-A-G-O-N, J-U-S-T-I-N. I am a small group leader in DLC. So what is happening today is we have a three-day field training for soldiers here in NCO Academy. Yesterday we had our walk phase where soldiers were assessed for conduct individual training where we assessed them and observed how they properly train a teacher class. In addition to teaching a class, we also assessed them on how they teach that task to standard. Today we have our leader stakes where there are 12 stations in the Academy where students rotate accordingly to perform the tasks that they taught yesterday. After our leader stakes, we move on to our squad stakes where all students and all squads are expected to apply everything that they learned from yesterday and during leader stakes. So the difficulty for the final cumulating exercise will vary depending on how much time and effort the soldiers put in from yesterday and today during leader stakes. In addition to that, a lot of these soldiers both will have experience and not have experience to what we are going to do here tonight during our squad stakes. So the cumulating exercise for the squad stakes will consist of three objectives. The soldiers will first make sure that they move accordingly as a squad into the starting position and once they SP to the first objective, they will identify civilians and they will have to report a spot rep. Once they do their spot rep, they will then react under direct fire, which will they need to react accordingly to move into the next objective. In objective number two, they will react to an ambush. Again, they should react accordingly based off of what they have learned yesterday and today. Upon the completion of reacting to an ambush, they will receive a casualty where they then need to assess the casualty. I'm going to pause real quick and apply necessary life saving interventions, move on to the landing zone to call a 9-9 Medibac and await for evacuation of the casualty. My name is Sergeant Cornette, C-O-R-N-E-T-T, first name Nicholas, N-I-C-H-O-L-A-S. My unit, I am with 2-C-R, 3-2 Squadron Chronos. I've originally started a B-L-C here at 04 August and we're graduating at 30 August. Today what we did inside the N-C-O-A Academy, we performed the stakes and that was basically going over. It's almost like an FT-X, like a live fire, but with the blanks and everything. We broke down between squads and had our own teams and everything. It was really good, honestly. I think in the N-C-O-A, they need to do it a lot more because high pressures like that and making fast decisions, that needs to happen more and more within N-C-Os and even at all positions, even working down from the lower ranks to the higher ranks. After I finished the stakes line, it was honestly really tough. Thick brush, a lot of decisions out of making map movements and a lot of pauses, going into making sure everybody's good, accounted for, taking a casualty, moving to the LZ. It was honestly, it was a lot of work, but it was really good at the same time. It was really fun, but it built a really big team camaraderie at the same time, big squad camaraderie.