Air Force

Staff Sgt. Jacob Poulliot: I would absolutely recommend military service to anybody that is graduating high school. It’s probably been one of the greatest experiences of my life.

Capt. Ryan McHugh: Being a pediatrician in the Air Force is, I think, a really neat experience. For me, it’s also a great chance to get to go fly as part of my job.

Staff Sgt. Jacob Poulliot: Today was one of our more typical days, I would say. Everyone’s always doing training; everyone’s always planning training, trying to stay the step ahead.

Capt. Ryan McHugh: You get a lot of responsibility from a very early time, and I really enjoyed the challenges. And I enjoyed the chance to have that responsibility.

Staff Sgt. Jacob Poulliot: You can always learn something, you can always advance your career in a different way. So I plan on staying with the Air Force for a while.

Yaffe:    My name is Kyle Yaffe.  I’m a first lieutenant in the United States Air Force, active duty.  And I’m a weather officer.  Both my team and I forecast, to make sure the Air Force pilots here at Vance are flying safely and efficiently.  It’s kind of a combination of ROTC...  And the professors at the University of Illinois that sold me on the idea, becoming a meteorologist...  I didn’t realize it was so physics‑ and math‑ and chemistry-intensive, which is what I was focused on a lot.  That’s really when I dove into it and decided to move forward.  Oklahoma is the best place, probably, to be a meteorologist, because it’s like the cliché center for severe weather.  Most times, if it’s going to be severe weather, it’s moving west to east.  So you can actually physically see the...  Maybe there’s a shelf cloud or something coming in or a warm cloud or a severe thunderstorm, something like that.  We get really excited about that stuff.  So.  (laughs) Before I joined the military, my whole goal, aside from my professional goals, was to be a better person, be a more honorable person.  That translated directly to the Air Force core values, “Integrity first.  Service before self.  Excellence in all you do.”  I’ll wake up in the morning and say like, “How will I live my day?  How will I serve the country or my family or my friends” or whatever the case may be.  So it just kind of becomes part of your collective conscious.  I’d like to think that, after my service period ends, whenever that might be, that that would continue to define me as a person.