Air Force, Army, Marine, and Navy students attend the Joint Engineer Operations Course at Kelley Barracks, Stuttgart, Germany, September 2022. The Army-led course is facilitated by the Air Force Institute of Technology’s Civil Engineer School with the objective to understand sister service engineer capabilities and considerations for joint engineer staff in preparation for future assignments to a Joint Task Force. (Contributed photo)

This past September, Airmen from both AFRICOM and EUCOM traveled to Kelley Barracks, Stuttgart, Germany to attend the Joint Engineer Operations Course (JEOC). This Army-led course is facilitated by The Civil Engineer School at the Air Force Institute of Technology (AFIT) and brings in civil engineer subject matter experts as instructors and students from each of the different services. The goal of the course is to prepare engineers from all military services for joint operations and teach them how to understand sister-service engineer capabilities, joint engineer doctrine, and sister-service engineer requirements. The course also covers theater-specific engineering considerations and challenges.

The September offering was attended by three Air Force, eleven Army, four Marine, and four Navy enlisted and officer engineers. The course is comprised of informational briefs in the morning followed by small group working sessions in the afternoon where joint planning and networking are emphasized. Capt. Kelly Minor, a previous student, praised the class saying, “JEOC was a great course and I highly recommend it to all Air Force civil engineers. Networking with our sister-service engineers highlighted unique service-specific perspectives and capabilities that are essential to our success as military engineers."

The course is broken up into two phases. Before attending in-residence, students must complete a self-paced distance learning component (approximately 32 hours) which aids in understanding the course material and primes attendees for the in-resident small group discussions and practicums. With respect to the course and its format, Lt. Col. Gene Bentley said, “The Joint Engineer Operations Course provides a one-of-a-kind opportunity to unite engineers from all services. Through both an online and in-resident class, it provides an efficient and effective blended curriculum. With varied locations, the course does a great job tailoring to the students and experts from the various theaters.”

The course is traditionally offered six times a year, with Air Force funding opportunities available for the Hawaii, Ohio, and Germany offerings. Students are welcome to apply to any offering, but priority for Hawaii and Germany offerings are given to INDOPACOM and EUCOM/AFRICOM students, respectfully. The remaining FY 23 offerings are:

• 6 – 10 Feb at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, HI
• 27 – 31 March at Fort Leonard Wood, MO
• 15 – 19 May at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, WA
• 5 – 9 June at Port Hueneme, CA
• 31 Jul – 4 Aug at Wright-Patterson AFB, OH
• 18 – 22 Sept at Stuttgart, Germany

Air Force civil engineers interested in attending one of the remaining offerings can apply to WMGT 590 via The Civil Engineer School course catalog page.

Any questions can be directed to Capt Dylan A. Gagnon at dylan.gagnon.1@us.af.mil.