FORT SILL, Okla. (April 9, 2015) -- The Fort Sill Marine Corps Artillery Detachment gathered April 2 to celebrate Joseph Milone's meritorious promotion to the rank of staff sergeant.
Milone was one of two Marines to be selected out of 180,000 others in the corps by showing outstanding performance in his duties, leadership, and meeting the highest physical fitness standards.
His commanders emphasized what an accomplishment this was.
"He's here at Fort Sill away from the Marine Corps flagpole in a support billet, not down range hunting bad guys," said Lt. Col. Richard Royse, MARDET executive officer. "It's very rare for somebody in one of these commands, in one of these billets to take it. It just shows you the character of that individual."
Milone was nominated by his command and then went through a board process. His fitness report and official military personnel profile were reviewed by a general officer board and his package continued through higher levels of competition until he was selected for promtion.
"They pick through it in great detail to figure out who is the most qualified," said Royse. He said they look at the Marine overall and take into account factors like their operations, their physical fitness test, combat physical fitness test, and professional military education.
"I think his last three fitness reports have been marked as high as they possibly could be," said Royse.
He said Milone came to Fort Sill to be a cannon crewmember instructor, and he has been the example for others.
"He's been our number one sergeant for the last three and a half years. Period. In everything. He's our best instructor, he's our best sergeant ... it's an extremely well deserved promotion to staff sergeant ahead of his peers. He will be a sergeant major."
Milone said the board process was difficult, but it was worth the extra effort. He said the challenge was something every Marine should look forward to.
"I had to make sure I had all my ducks in a row. It goes back to the day I pinned on sergeant in Afghanistan and probably before then. Just being the best Marine I could be all the time. That was a tough challenge," said Milone.
His advice to other Marines going through the process is to, "Know your job and do Marine things, PT, lead, take care of other Marines.
"The main thing is you've got to love what you do and you've got to love taking care of Marines that come behind you, your junior Marines."
"What I was reminding everybody here of was that every Marine that comes here to instruct is hand selected. Whether they are officers, or sergeants, or staff sergeants, or gunnery sergeants; they are all hand selected to come here and Staff Sergeant Milone now getting meritoriously promoted is just one example of the quality of Marines that we have here," said Col. Wayne Harrison, MARDET commander.
"The Marine Corps invests in the school houses. We believe that's what makes Marines so good is we put the quality in the instructorship and then we make good Marines and they go on to be instructors later on," the colonel said. "That's what I was telling the young Marines here (private first classes and) the privates they should aspire to be the next Staff Sergeant Milone."
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