Advanced Training

Speaker 1: As soon as they told me about the job I wanted it.

Speaker 2: I possess the ability to hold a top secret SCI clearance.

Speaker 1: I am a Cryptologic Technician Collection, so I specialize in the analysis and collection of signals. Sounds a little bizarre but how vague the description was actually made me want to find out more about it.

Speaker 2: They look at the socio-political climate and try and predict what cyber-related incidents could be created due to what’s happening in the world.

Speaker 1: This way has ensured that our ships stay safe at sea, ensures that we can bring our Sailors home safely, it ensures that the big letter agencies, NSA, CIA, can do their job in protecting the homeland. It gives you situational awareness of what’s happening in the world so you can keep everyone safe coming home.

Speaker 2: They protect from viruses and make sure those networks are secured.

Speaker 2: Being a CT does not exempt you from the rest of Navy life. You will be working on the decks with everyone else; you will get to experience what it’s like to be a real Sailor working at sea. Working topside, preservation, maintenance, standing on the flight deck with everyone else for ceremonies. There’s definitely moments of camaraderie like you see amongst the Sailors when we get together. You can’t learn this level of teamwork or flexibility anywhere else.

Speaker One: Yo, get in! Get in! Get in! Clear! (Gunshots)

1st Lt. Akhil Iyer: What excites me to be in the Marine Corps, and to be an infantry officer is, honestly, the people around you. It’s working with the fellow platoon commanders and, ultimately, your Marines. The thing that strikes me most is their ability to learn from their lessons, learn from the experiences, and use the experiences of those around them, and within their team. So, in preparing my Marines for an operation, whether that’s in training or on deployment, there’s a lot of prior rehearsals and prior training that goes into it.

(Addressing Marines) The fact that we’re looking for is that enemy machine-gun bunker, that anti-tank guided missile, is suppressed in order to allow us occupy Red Beach, and deal with that threat on the go.

Briefing’s a very important part, communicating, you know, as much detail as possible to those Marines who are executing that attack, and there is a — a structure to that that provides them with the framework that they need to successfully conduct that exercise. You’re communicating not only that enemy situation, what can they expect on that objective, but also what that general scheme maneuver is, where is each platoon moving and where is each squad moving.

(Addressing Marines) We are able to advance through the corridor unimpeded by those OPs, those IEF or those overwhelming positions.

The time right before an operation gives us an opportunity to confirm what the Marines are doing and to get back briefs to ensure that they understand the plan and that any details are covered. I’ve learned, you know, one, you’re always going to learn something every day. Second, that, you know, you really gotta know your trade in and out, and be confident in providing that — that plan.

Prior to actually conducting that attack, you’re doing that last-minute confirmation with — with your fellow platoon commanders, with the squad leaders, ensuring that they understand the plan. If there’s a detail that they’re unsure about, that’s the time to just hone it in and ensure that everyone understands. (Gunshots)

Here in training, the objective is always to stress some sort of decision-making. You know, find a way to make the situation complicated, and have everyone from that rifle-team leader, that squad leader and that platoon commander, to give them opportunities to exercise some decision-making. And it’s definitely a very quick process. I think a lot of that goes in that prior planning. We have multiple urban setups, and it gives us an opportunity to work through clearing of urban terrain. (Shouting, gunshots, explosion)

An explosion goes, you have an aggressive team leader, an aggressive squad leader who’s going to continue that attack, and continue the momentum forward, and that’s something that definitely is a little more complex, requires a little bit more detail and coordination, but is definitely valuable to the Marines, and to our training as we think about how we maneuver through a town and how we seize that objective.

It’s a great opportunity. You know, where else as a young 23-year-old, do I have the opportunity to work with the people here and the assets that we have to accomplish that mission, and serve at the same time?

Airman 1st Class Jamil Harrell: I had always had an interest in anatomy and physics, and I always wanted to help people, but I didn't know how I could put them all together, and then as soon as I ended up in the diagnostic imaging course, I realized it was exactly what I wanted to do.

Lynnette Biglane: We teach the students how to take X-rays, but just learning how to take X-rays is not the only thing they have to learn.

Airman 1st Class Jada Forney: I'm Airman 1st Class Jada Forney, I'm from Sacramento, Calif.

Airman 1st Class Jamil Harrell: I'm Airman 1st Class Jamil Harrell. I'm from San Antonio, Texas, and I am a diagnostic imaging student.

Corey Johnson: You're always going to be dealing with anatomy and physiology. We need to know the physics side, and you understand the techniques and how you can acquire a good quality X-ray from a small patient versus a larger patient, it goes all into the physics.

Lynnette Biglane: Not only just you know the bones of the body, but we also learn and X-ray the soft tissue structures. We learn about the brain and X-ray the brain, the spinal cord. So we're able to do every bit of anatomy that's in the body.

Airman 1st Class Jada Forney: They want us to get training in every aspect of our career field, whether that's just shooting regular routines, going to surgery, doing portables, which is like going up to a different floor to do a chest X-ray on a patient that can't come down to our floor, we get to do all that.

Lynnette Biglane: They don't know from one minute to the next what type of X-ray they may be confronted with.

Airman 1st Class Jada Forney: I was thrown in a surgery the second week I came here as being a student. It's just — it's an unreal experience because you're working right alongside the doctor, and they want everything, like, stat.

Airman 1st Class Jamil Harrell: We do roughly about six hours of X-rays a day. That's about the time that we spend actually hands-on shooting, and then two hours of class time.

Corey Johnson: So it's being reinforced with the teaching, but the hands-on is really important because that's when they're interacting with the patients.

Lynnette Biglane: Once you get your X-ray training completed, then you can advance into what we call the special modality areas.

Airman 1st Class Jada Forney: I'm thinking about either mammography or ultrasound.

Airman 1st Class Jamil Harrell: It doesn't just feel like a job. And it doesn't just feel like school. It feels like I'm doing something more, and I'm doing it with other people who are struggling the same way I am, you know, the students who are just trying to say, you know, I feel like I don't know enough. And people are trying to tell us, you know more than you think. Just keep pushing yourself.