Representatives from all four Army Initial Entry Training installations attended a Drill Sergeant Program of Instruction Symposium at the U.S. Army Drill Sergeant Academy June 26-28 to develop a strategy to meet the Center of Initial Military Training commander's intent of building expert trainers.
While thanking the attendees for their time and dedication, Command Sgt. Maj. Edward Mitchell, senior enlisted leader for the Center of Initial Military Training as that all take one message home with them.
"Thank you for taking the time to come down here to show how important this really is," Mitchell said. "The message I want you to take out of here is; we are training the leaders of tomorrow. I'm talking about future drill sergeants; because the leaders that come here are going to be much different when they leave."
Over the course of two days the representatives participated in the development of a drill sergeant course training strategy that would achieve the desired capability levels for USADSA graduates.
Command Sgt. Maj. Lamont Christian, senior enlisted leader for Fort Jackson and former commandant of the academy echoed Mitchell's gratitude for the attendees support saying that he felt good about the future.
"When I was a private in formation I had no clue I was going to one day be the commandant of the drill sergeant school, then later the academy or that I would be a command sergeant major, that was not my vision; I just wanted to be a good private and you all are the reason that we're going to have future generals come out of your formations."
Christian added that the POI symposium attendees displayed the two key ingredients necessary to train the leaders of tomorrow.
"There are two things we look for especially in this environment; compliance and commitment," he said. "You all demonstrated compliance because you go out there and continue to survive in your job, by coming here; participating, giving input and information and giving the feedback to help create change; you have demonstrated commitment."
Christian requested that the attendees go back and deliver the message to their installations.
"I feel good that we are in good hands for future command sergeants major," he added. "Sgt. Maj. Mitchell hit it on the head; we are training tomorrow's leaders. All I ask is, that you go back as the messenger and get the rest of our team mates to understand that you are complying all day and where is your commitment is at."
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