Sergeant Smith recognized as one of AF Reserve's best

  • Published
  • By Lt. Col. Rich Curry
  • 507th Air Refueling Wing
TINKER AIR FORCE BASE, Oklahoma --  Tech Sgt. Aaron M. Smith, a cyber systems surety craftsman and NCOIC of the Network Control Center, received the Air Force Communications and Information Annual Individual Award for 3C NCO. Sergeant Smith lives in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Sergeant Smith was one of four Airmen from the 35th Combat Communications Squadron receiving top honors in this year's Air Force Reserve Command's 2009 Communications and Information Awards program.

Lt. Col. Pete Peterson, 35th CBCS commander, praised the squadron Airmen receiving awards. "They are sharp people. Their recognition stems from their outstanding efforts during our recent Operational Readiness Inspection," he said .

Sergeant Smith received his CCAF Associate Degree in Information Systems Management and completed Airman's Leadership School in 2005 and NCO Academy in 2009.  Colonel Peterson describes Sergeant Smith as a "Stellar NCO" and a main contributor to the unit's "Excellent" ORI rating.

"Smith took charge and within the first 48 hours of the ORI, his team successfully
configured, upgraded and palletized critical network control center systems, provided extended services to four wing organizations and 196 customers within 12 hours under adverse conditions and established secure and non-secure network with e-mail and file sharing to 194 user accounts at four sites.

Peterson stated the 35th CBCS was the first CBCS to deploy a communications network using the Block 50 upgrade. "Sergeant Smith identified configuration problems identified to the Electronics Systems Center Project Management Office and to Air Force Engineering & Technical Services. This field testing resulted in Air Force-wide corrective actions and other multiple fixes for Theater Deployable Communications deployable servers.  He promptly directed responses and reporting of detected network faults, security incidents and user-reported outages.

He quickly and successfully restored two servers after two separate failures with hardly visible downtimes. Sergeant Smith was cited for his leadership and foresight which directly impacted the unit's ability to extend services and install required equipment. He readily assists in the development of effective crew position training and certification. He
continuously mentors squadron Airmen to include all flight newcomers, overseeing the development of future NCOs.