First group of Soldiers graduate from Drill Sergeant Conversion Course

The first graduates of the Drill Sergeant Conversion Course received their distinctive headgear March 9 during a ceremony held at the Armed Forces Chaplaincy Center at Fort Jackson, South Carolina.

The conversion ceremony presented more than 70 former platoon sergeants as certified drill sergeants complete with a campaign or bush hat. Earlier this year the Army decided to return drill sergeants to Advanced Individual Training units.

"But it's not about the hat," said Command Sgt. Maj. Edward Mitchell, senior enlisted leader for the Center of Initial Military Training. "The Army gives us great non-commissioned officers to be drill sergeants. The non-commissioned officer is already a leader and because they are already leaders, the hat does not make a leader; the leader makes the hat."

Forever a symbol of excellence, the return of drill sergeants to AIT will be a constant reminder to new Soldiers that greatness does not just happen. For a Soldier to become a symbol of excellence, they must live the army values and exemplify the warrior ethos in the mist of new challenges and at times.

"We look at this process that we call soldierization as forging a Soldier out of raw material," said Command Sgt. Maj. Lamont Christian, senior enlisted leader for Fort Jackson and former commandant of the U.S. Army Drill Sergeant Academy. "The Basic Combat Training drill sergeant creates the basic form and the AIT drill sergeant fine tunes it and delivers to the first unit of assignment a Soldier."

Christian said the process is "deliberate" and "monumental in the sense that we've given the focus to the AIT leadership saying here's an opportunity for you to continue the transformation of a civilian through the trainee process to becoming a Soldier, by fine tuning the skills that they received in basic training."

The two-week conversion course conducted at the Drill Sergeant Academy, encompasses the knowledge, abilities and training expected of a drill sergeant and includes rifle marksmanship, drill sergeant duties and responsibilities, drill and ceremony, and chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear defense training.

Staff Sgt. Marcus Robinson, a newly-minted drill sergeant from Fort Lee, Virginia, said he is looking forward to sending better trained Soldiers to the operational forces.

"We will to build on the training they received in BCT and continue to Soldier them so that they will go to (Forces Command) more prepared than what they were," he said.

Forces Command is in charge of all operational units in the Army.

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