The SLDN option did not really pan out.
They suggested I try to apply to the Air Force Reserves, given my age. But while I was searching online jobs associated with the Air Force, I did come across two notifications that the English Department at the Air Force Academy was looking for two civilian professors next fall: One with a degree in Rhetoric and Composition and the other in Post Civil War American Literature. While I do not have a PhD, I do have a Master's Degree in the Humanities that was good enough to get me hired at the Academy back in 1977-8 to teach, starting in the fall of 1978.
I am currently reworking my cover letter, resume, and professional/personal references to apply. Fortunately, I have already sent off for an additional copy of my DD 214, for veteran's preference; and I sent off for Official copies of my four sets of college transcripts.
I suppose this means I could return to teach at the Academy in an ideal situation because I would be a civilian instructor there. While I would not be in uniform, I would be back in the classroom. That is, of course, if I am selected. And that could be a long shot, depending upon the other applicants.
Of course, while I have significant experience teaching military students at Fort Carson and Peterson Air Force for Pikes Peak Community College, as well as Academy cadets in the fall of 1978 and the spring and summer of 1979, it's been a few years since I was last in the class room. I have also been a technical writer/editor at IBM and elsewhere for the past 31 years, so that ought to count for something.
When I taught at the Academy, I was also chosen to be the Officer-in-Charge (OIC) of the Cadet Film and Badminton Clubs, in addition to being co-editor of the cadet creative writing publication, Icarus. I was selected to be the English Department liaison for the introduction of computers since I was the department supply officer. In the fall of 1979, I was to teach the prestigious television course, Blue Tube. That never happened, obviously. But the fact that I was selected ought to also count for something.
Tomorrow will be the 32nd anniversary of my leaving the Academy on October 12, 1979. When I was clearing out my books from my office, the elevator stuck between floors while I was aboard. I took it as a sign that even the building didn't want to let me leave. Eventually, it reached the top floor and opened to let me out.
When I got home, I took off my uniform for the last time and went to dinner with a neighbor. It all seems like recalling the immediate events of yesterday not yester year.
AIDS, PCs, laptops, Hi Def TVs, Blu-ray discs, the coming in and going out of DADT, gay marriage, and so many other tragic or remarkable developments have occurred since then. Of those whom I met at the Academy or knew because of events at the Academy, Dan Stratford's friend George Gordy and his partner, Dick Tuttle, died in 1989, while Dan died in 1995. I do believe they would have been surprised at many of these changes.
Not a day would go by--if I were able to return to teaching at the Academy--that I would not remember all that we went through back then and all that has happened to us since. Will the cosmos click back into place, undoing what was done so many, many years ago? I simply do not know though I always remain optimistic.
They suggested I try to apply to the Air Force Reserves, given my age. But while I was searching online jobs associated with the Air Force, I did come across two notifications that the English Department at the Air Force Academy was looking for two civilian professors next fall: One with a degree in Rhetoric and Composition and the other in Post Civil War American Literature. While I do not have a PhD, I do have a Master's Degree in the Humanities that was good enough to get me hired at the Academy back in 1977-8 to teach, starting in the fall of 1978.
I am currently reworking my cover letter, resume, and professional/personal references to apply. Fortunately, I have already sent off for an additional copy of my DD 214, for veteran's preference; and I sent off for Official copies of my four sets of college transcripts.
I suppose this means I could return to teach at the Academy in an ideal situation because I would be a civilian instructor there. While I would not be in uniform, I would be back in the classroom. That is, of course, if I am selected. And that could be a long shot, depending upon the other applicants.
Of course, while I have significant experience teaching military students at Fort Carson and Peterson Air Force for Pikes Peak Community College, as well as Academy cadets in the fall of 1978 and the spring and summer of 1979, it's been a few years since I was last in the class room. I have also been a technical writer/editor at IBM and elsewhere for the past 31 years, so that ought to count for something.
When I taught at the Academy, I was also chosen to be the Officer-in-Charge (OIC) of the Cadet Film and Badminton Clubs, in addition to being co-editor of the cadet creative writing publication, Icarus. I was selected to be the English Department liaison for the introduction of computers since I was the department supply officer. In the fall of 1979, I was to teach the prestigious television course, Blue Tube. That never happened, obviously. But the fact that I was selected ought to also count for something.
Tomorrow will be the 32nd anniversary of my leaving the Academy on October 12, 1979. When I was clearing out my books from my office, the elevator stuck between floors while I was aboard. I took it as a sign that even the building didn't want to let me leave. Eventually, it reached the top floor and opened to let me out.
When I got home, I took off my uniform for the last time and went to dinner with a neighbor. It all seems like recalling the immediate events of yesterday not yester year.
AIDS, PCs, laptops, Hi Def TVs, Blu-ray discs, the coming in and going out of DADT, gay marriage, and so many other tragic or remarkable developments have occurred since then. Of those whom I met at the Academy or knew because of events at the Academy, Dan Stratford's friend George Gordy and his partner, Dick Tuttle, died in 1989, while Dan died in 1995. I do believe they would have been surprised at many of these changes.
Not a day would go by--if I were able to return to teaching at the Academy--that I would not remember all that we went through back then and all that has happened to us since. Will the cosmos click back into place, undoing what was done so many, many years ago? I simply do not know though I always remain optimistic.
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