The Coast Guard is rolling out a new enlisted education track that will send newly rated members into the fleet with leadership skills and continue to build on and refresh the training throughout their careers.
Starting this year, junior enlisted Coast Guardsmen will have to check in for resident training to qualify for advancement to make E-4, E-6, E-7 and E-9.
That adds two brand new courses and makes chief training mandatory, Master Chief Petty Officer of the Coast GuardNavy Steven Cantrell told Navy Times in an early April interview.
And chiefs will have to complete the for E-7s who opted out of the previously voluntary chief petty officer academy before they advanced, they won't be able to make E-8 without it.
The enlisted education overhaul was at the top of Cantrell's list of goals for his tenure when he took over two years ago. On top of solidifying senior enlisted training, the changes created the apprentice leadership program as an E-4 advancement wicket, unique to the Coast Guard.
The course is like a beginner's guide to leadership, Cantrell said, covering the same topics as the chief or master chief's training but from a more junior perspective.
"For the most part, if you've got somebody that comes into the Coast Guard, goes to boot camp and then goes right into 'A' school, they don't know what they don't know yet," he said.
Rather than throw them right into a command with half a dozen people working under them, they'll have some skills to work with.
"What we see at the junior levels is, they don't know how to deal with stuff," he said, like sexual assault and alcohol abuse. "They'll just go find the chief. But if we give them the tools, it doesn't have to turn into a crisis."
The bystander intervention model the services teach applies here, but with a little more weight behind it because of a petty officer's leadership role.
"Seaman Johnny comes in late for work and smells like he just came from a bar, what are you going to do?" Cantrell said. "How do you deal with that and which resources do you turn to? Make sure that person doesn't have a career-ending experience because the third class didn't know how to handle it."
That training is also meant to stop sexual assault in the junior ranks, by teaching young petty officers to identify behavior and nip it in the bud.
Leaders can give speeches about the scourges of sexual assault and alcohol abuse, Cantrell said, but he and his colleagues will be forced to retire before the problems are solved.
"What I tell them is, you guys have got this. You will fix this, not me," he said. "If you want it to go away, you have to start owning some of this, but we need to give you the tools to do it."
The changes are important from a manpower angle, as well.
"We're a small service, and we can't really afford to lose people to the things that we can intervene with early on," he said.
If someone advanced last year and they haven't been yet, they would be at the top. Somebody who made chief last year and hasn't been, one they're probably not going to go anyway and they wouldn't go, they'll be at the bottom.
Moving up
It used to be that Coast Guardsmen got their first formal leadership training at E-5, a week-long, off-site course.
"It was something, but our fear was you get that chief petty officer that's had five days of leadership," Cantrell said.
The new E-4 program lays the foundation, but in order to keep it going, members will have to attend the leadership and management school to make E-6.
"They're building them at the E-4 level all the way through," Cantrell said, with refresher training on topics like inspections, fitness and financial management.
If it works with their schedules, they can substitute the training with the Air Force's noncommissioned officer academy or airmen leadership school.
The next step was making the chief petty officer's academy mandatory. The Coast Guard has about 1,000 E-7s now that didn't go to training before they pinned on chief, Cantrell said.
New chiefs will have priority in the next cycles, but if they put it off, they'll have to wait for a spot or go to the Air Force's senior NCO academy if they want to make senior chief.
"If someone advanced last year and they haven't been yet, they would be at the top," Cantrell said. "Somebody who made chief last year and hasn't been — they're probably not going to go anyway and they wouldn't go — they'll be at the bottom."
And things are staying the same for the senior enlisted leadership course, which has been a requirement to make E-9. Members also have the option to attend the Navy's senior enlisted academy.
Meghann Myers is the Pentagon bureau chief at Military Times. She covers operations, policy, personnel, leadership and other issues affecting service members.
