Tadah! I’m here again and my new topic is Air Force ROTC at Riddle. As I’ve mentioned before I am a freshman cadet on the Prescott campus and I am loving my experience in the Air Force and in college so far. I just thought it would be nice to give you an insiders look at what a week as a GMC (General Military Cadet) is like.
The first thing you need to know is how the Cadet Wing works, there are POC (Professional Officer Candidates) and GMC. The GMC are the lower class and are typically freshman and sophomores in college while the POC are juniors and seniors who have already gone through field training and are simply waiting for life as an officer in the Air Force to begin.The POC must be saluted by the GMC as they are the people running the cadet wing and training us to be officers. Even more important above the POC is the cadre, these guys are awesome!! They teach everyone to be an officer and they make sure we get all our things done on time.
POC Cadets selected to be future pilots in the Air Force
The average week for a GMC cadet is as follows: Tuesday: get up and go to PT. Wednesday: go to Leadership Laboratory where you learn to be a leader and get amazing opportunities to meet people and get involved in the community. Thursday: get up and go to PT. And at some point during the week you might have a flight drill and ceremonies practice, extra PT or a meeting about a flight goal that you want to accomplish. Additionally, you must attend an Air Force class to learn about the Air Force and explore what a career in the military means to you. Its pretty simple and exceedingly fun/rewarding.
There are also AFROTC groups you can be apart of if you wish to get more involved or to become a better cadet. Some of these are Honor Corps, with the 3 teams which are described in my blog entitled “SCIDM- Honor Corps”, Arnold Air Society (these guys are cool), and Silver Wings (an affiliate of Arnold Air Society). All of these groups teach discipline and perfection; so if you are looking to succeed in AFROTC then joining one of these groups would be great for you!
One final note that I must point out is that I urge you if you are even moderately interested in the Air Force, please try out AFROTC if you get the chance. Dive in and give it your all, you may discover yourself living a dream that you had never imagined you would hold.
If you have any questions feel free to ask!!
