The world around us is changing rapidly - with impacts on our Naval Reserve and civilian careers. Having two careers in parallel helps us become more adaptable in either, less vulnerable and more survivable. And we are all engaged in being a part of the "High Tech Brain Trust."How do we keep on top of a technology-stimulated ever changing world? Through training and networking. We each have a high personal investment in our technical education. About 100 of us have doctorates and the other 700 have masters degrees. We know that the half life of a technical degree is probably five years. So, to meet the technical needs of the Navy we need to keep current.
Engineering duty officers need large doses of education to keep up with the Navy, our gaining commands, and our home technologies. We have hundreds of units, dozens of gaining commands, and each one of us has a unique mixture of technology expertise. Remember that CAPT Bill Kastner's expertise catalog has over 6,300 entries. And we are often able to tailor a very specific Naval need to an individual in the "High Tech Brain Trust."
To keep our expertise fresh we do training in many dimensions. A new NRED, as part of the NR Engineering Duty Qualification Program, attends a two-week Engineering Duty course at the ED School at Mare Island. The course is designed to mirror the Regular ED course - aimed at the technical needs of the Navy.
A two-week course is also being offered for newly selected Lieutenant Commanders. We have a one-week course for the new Commanders and a training weekend for Captains.
But most important - we have MultiREDCOM Technical Training Meetings on the East and West Coasts. These are full scale advanced training sessions where technical papers are presented in breakout periods appropriate to a wide variety of technical needs of the Navy.
The high tech education reputation of these meetings has increased over the years so that active duty ED's and other officers in NAVSEA and SPAWAR attend -and the MRTT's are so respected that they are strongly endorsed and co-sponsored by the American Society of Naval Engineers. The networking that occurs in the halls between sessions is also a significant technical value-added. Many projects and issues are discussed and advanced in this way.
The stress on resources may require some creative thinking on your part to attend a Technical Training Meeting - but there are ways to do it. One way is to use a split AT. IDTT is most often used. And in some cases car pools and room sharing has lessened the cost for those who attend using non-pay ADT orders.
Training for NRED's is our life's blood. We need it to keep in the saddle while we ride the bucking brono - the tiger of technology, accelerating changes - based on the technology that we have to know and have to use for the Navy.