Staff Sergeant Garcia?

Steven was asked to go to ALS (Airman Leadership School) this month. Usually they ask airmen who have already passed their staff sergeant test, but of course, Steven is an excellent firefighter and airmen, so they sent him early. Steven tested last year for staff and didn't pass, but we will find out next week if he passed. The testing is kind of weird to me. You take two tests, one on AF history and one is job specific, and the rest of the decision for you to rank up, is how active you've been with you AF career. How many deployments you've been on, years in service, and all other kinds of stuff. I'm proud of Steven either way and he would be an EXCELLENT staff sergeant because he basically oversees guys at work anyway. It's kind of a catch 22 with making staff. After you make staff, you get a line number. Until your number is I guess activated, you are still a Senior Airman. It usually takes a year for you to put on staff/ your number to be called. Steven's job is overcrowded with Staff Sergeants, and many of the guys that finally get activated get forcefully re-classed, meaning they are forced to retrain in a new job, and not do firefighting and meaning sending you off to a different base. Making staff is an honor, but it's short lived in your current job. We have a lot of thinking to do in the next couple of months. Steven has the date of November 18th, where we can put in for our base of preference! California, Idaho, and Colorado are the states where the bases we can are located. If there is room for Steven there at any of those 6 bases, then we will be moving in a matter of months after November. If the first round of trying gets denied and all the bases are full, we have to wait 3 months to try again for the same bases and hopefully something will turn up available. Long process, and who knows, Steven might decide to retrain for a new job, so we might have a better chance to stay in and be closer to home. There is still a huge possibility we could move back home to Sacramento as well. We have more options than two people could have, but we will make the one that is best for us and the future we want to have. Steven still needs to finish school and I still want to go to graduate school. Staying in would allow us to get both of our educations finished for free. YES! For frrrreeeeeeeeeeeeee. (like Adam Sandler in Bedtime Stories.) We will keep everyone updated on everything once we know more. In a perfect world, I pray for us to be able to go to a base that we would want and be stationed closer to our families, to both finish school, and start thinking about having a family.