Fort McCoy leaders speak at Wisconsin Student Leadership Conference

Leaders with the Fort McCoy Garrison command team spoke April 4 at the Wisconsin Association of School Councils (WASC) Leadership Conference in the Wisconsin Dells, Wis.

Deputy Garrison Commander Lt. Col. Chad Maynard; Command Sgt. Maj. Raquel DiDomenico, garrison command sergeant major; and Headquarters and Headquarters Company Commander Maj. James Lavelle spoke on the importance of leadership to outstanding student council members from middle and high schools from around the state of Wisconsin.

The discussion was facilitated by WASC Executive Director Bjorn Berg.

Fort McCoy was invited to the 2022 conference to present about leadership in the military, for each leader to share their experiences about when they were in school, and the reasons behind their choices to join the U.S. Army.

The students broke into two sessions — one with the middle schools and one with the high schools — to answer specific questions for each group.

DiDomenico said she was specifically asked about being a woman in the Army and to share her experiences. She shared her own examples of becoming a leader and talked about the outstanding opportunities the military has to offer and how all military occupational specialties are now to women. She also that one in four U.S. Army Reserve Soldiers are women.

During the high school group, the team invited a few volunteers to come up and participate in a push-up challenge after DiDomenico demonstrated the correct form for an Army push-up.

The event participation is part of regular community engagement by Fort McCoy military and civilian personnel.

Fort McCoy Garrison command staff and the Fort McCoy Public Affairs Office helped coordinated the conference participation.

Fort McCoy’s motto is to be the “Total Force Training Center.” Located in the heart of the upper Midwest, Fort McCoy is the only U.S. Army installation in Wisconsin.

The installation has provided support and facilities for the field and classroom training of more than 100,000 military personnel from all services nearly every year since 1984.

Learn more about Fort McCoy online at https://home.army.mil/mccoy, on the Defense Visual Information Distribution System at https://www.dvidshub.net/fmpao, on Facebook by searching “ftmccoy,” and on Twitter by searching “usagmccoy.”

Also try downloading the Digital Garrison app to your smartphone and set “Fort McCoy” or another installation as your preferred base.