By CRISTINA JANNEY
Hays Post
Air rushed into the cabin of the Blackhawk helicopters like a sweeping inhale.
The ground slowly diminished under their feet, and Hays became a landscape of toy trucks and round bales the size of marshmallows — a familiar landscape from a very unfamiliar perspective.
National Guard airmen know this every day, but for a group of area dignitaries, educators and the media members, it was a very new and exhilarating experience.
The Kansas National Guard 108th Aviation took the group up in their UH-60 Blackhawks Wednesday as part of a session to better inform local leaders about the importance of Guard recruitment.
The Army announced Tuesday it ended its fiscal year below its authorized personnel strength for all three of its components — Army, Army Reserve and National Guard.
The Army National Guard will be 8,000 below its authorized strength of 343,500.
Retention numbers are high for the Guard, but the problem has been recruiting.
The Army Guard failed to reached its accessions goal every year since 2014. But in 2018, the drop was “significant,” said Lt. Gen. Timothy J. Kadavy, director of the Army National Guard, in a column that will appear in the October NATIONAL GUARD magazine.
To combat this, the Kansas Legislature, enacted a bill during the 2017 session, which will reimburse students 100 percent of their college tuition for undergraduate studies at state colleges. Retirement benefits have also increased for National Guard members.
The state benefits can be combined with federal Montgomery GI Bill benefits for private school or grad school.
Capt. Matthew Ayres, Bravo Company Recruiting Commander, said he used his education benefits to earn his bachelor’s degree in organizational leadership and will soon complete his master’s degree in organizational leadership.
If a service person does not use all of their education benefits, they can pass them to a spouse or dependent child. Ayres has given a portion of his unused benefits to each of his four children.
Sgt. Mikayla Nicodemus used her education benefits to recently complete culinary school through NCK-Tech. When Nicodemus is not on Guard duty, she is a stay-at-home mom. She uses her culinary background to do catering to supplement her family’s income.
Guard recruits cite education benefits as their No. 1 reason for signing up.
Ayres said the Guard encourages its personnel to go to school and increase their training, because they see those soldiers as better prepared to complete their missions.
Ayres also said the state and federal government are beginning to understand the current service of National Guardsmen and women goes beyond the one weekend a month and two weeks a year that used to be the Guard’s mantra.
The National Guard serves a dual role. It serves in cases of state emergency, including floods, snow storms and wildfires.
However, the Guard can also be federalized to serve in conflicts overseas.
Several of the guardsmen and women who were on hand for the Blackhawk flights on Wednesday had been deployed to serve overseas during their terms of service.
Maj. Patrik Goss, Blackhawk pilot and full-time guardsman, has been deployed overseas multiple times, serving in Iraq, Bosnia and Kuwait.
The Blackhawks move people, parts and equipment. The helicopters can also be outfitted with armaments for aerial assault missions during which they drop soldiers in hostile areas and then pick them up from missions.
Goss’ background was in law enforcement before he became a Guard pilot. He trained for a year to be a pilot, but your training never stops once you are a pilot.
For those young people who would like to some day fly with a Blackhawk crew, Goss said they need to stay out of trouble and finish high school.
“We have so many opportunities right now,” Goss said of Guard for young people. “One of the biggest ones is after they passed the bill that is paying for college. I am talking about all of college. It’s insane. I wish I would have had that when I was going to college.”
Goss said he loves his job and would recommend it to young people looking for a career.
“At the absolute base level, the American taxpayers let me climb into a $24-million machine and fly, and they trained me to do it,” he said. “Am I a kid at heart? Yes, I absolutely am. It is wonderful. I can’t explain it. It is the greatest roller coaster on the planet.
“On the professional level, it paid for my master’s degree, allowed me to command troops both in combat and in Kansas. It allows us to go out and help the citizens whenever we are called upon and provide a tool that we can take almost anywhere.”
Goss is a lifelong Kansan and is now stationed in Salina. He has also served at home during floods, in northwest Kansas last year and this spring dumping water on wildfires. His crew also spots stranded motorists during snow storms.
“Kansas has been home my whole life,” he said. “It is no different than when I was a police officer. People call and you have the ability to go out and help where others can’t. You can’t explain that feeling. The gratitude is overwhelming, and the feeling when you go home and tell your kids what you did that day is pretty inspiring.”
Sandra Gottschalk, dean of the Hays NCK-Tech campus, said meeting the Guardsmen and riding on the Blackhawk helped open her eyes about how the Guard and the college can better work together.
The Guard offers training in many technical skills that relate back to jobs in the community, including welding, truck driving, construction, computer science, health care and many more.
“Definitely it opens eyes,” she said, “the educator eyes at the colleges and universities. At the technical college, we do a lot of the same things, so it would be a good partnership.”
Sen. Elaine Bowers, R-Concordia, said she could see how the education bill the Legislature passed last spring was assisting people in the state.
“I am very happy to know they are working with our local high schools, community colleges and vocation schools,” she said. “It think that is very key.”
Bowers said it was a thrill to ride in the Blackhawk, but it was important to see that the Guardsmen were well-trained and could execute their maneuvers safely.
For more information about joining the National Guard, contact SSG. Enrique Martinez, recruiting and retention NCO in Hays, at 785-806-2123 or by email at [email protected]. Find more information on education benefits by calling 1-785-646-0155 or go to the National Guard website.