Aides to Senator Tammy Duckworth visited Training Support Center (TSC) Great Lakes, Surface Warfare Officer Unit (SWOSU) Great Lakes and Center for Surface Combat Systems Unit (CSCSU) Great Lakes March 20.

The purpose of the visit was to familiarize them to the training used at the commands that provided 24-hour supervision, leadership, training and mentorship of Sailors.

“The goal today is to come up and see Navy entry training to get a better understanding on how the Navy is training its Sailors and the challenges they face with facilities or resourcing,” said Mr. Matt Lampert, military legislative assistant to Sen. Duckworth. “Then we can take that information back to Senator Duckworth, brief her and, since she is a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, she can make more informed decisions about how to resource or provide the right authorities for the Navy to do a better or more efficient job in the future.”  

The day began with a tour of the student indoctrination’s Life Skills training. Sailors arriving on board from boot camp attend the training before any rate-specific courses. Subjects taught in the course cover sexual assault intervention, military pay and entitlements, healthy relationships, navigating stress, operations security, banking and financial management service, and responsible alcohol use.

 “I am proud of the work our Sailors do in training students for their future in the Navy.” said Cmdr. Jason Juergens, executive officer at TSC Great Lakes. “The Life Skills curriculum is an important first step in these young Sailors lives, some of whom have transitioned directly from high school to the Navy; not having a lot of life experiences to utilize these skills.”

At SWOSU Great Lakes, command leadership led a tour of the training facilities of Basic Engineering Common Core (BECC). 

"Today was an excellent opportunity to showcase SWOSU Great Lakes Staff, curriculum, labs and students in their learning environment," said Lt. Megan Leis, executive officer of SWOSU Great Lakes. "We also think it is important that they know, and they can take back to the people that they serve that their sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, are safe and learning good quality skills that they can use for the rest of their life."

BECC is a 13-day course where students learn engineering principals and theory. It balances Computer Based Training CBT training with hands-on training labs, instructor-led classroom training. They also visited the SICLOS Lab, and Purifier Lab and 19H6 and Diesel Highbay.

At CSCSU Great Lakes command leadership led a tour of the USS Whitehat, a static boat used by the Boatswain's Mate apprentice and Surface Common Core school.

"We are blessed at CSCSU Great Lakes to have such an exceptional staff delivering the Navy's newest vision in accession level training," said Lt. Cmdr. Mark A. Hovan, executive officer of CSCSU Great Lakes. "Visits such as this allow us to showcase these outstanding instructors and provide a look into our vision and execution of an agile, innovative organization that leverages technologies and techniques to train accession Surface Sailors for Fleet assignments."

Staff and leadership led a presentation of CSCSU Great Lakes training, facilities, budgets and technology.

“I never had a chance to visit Great Lakes in my time on active duty and I have blown away by the sheer scope and scale of all the activities and training that is going on,” Lampert said. “There is a group of super professional chiefs and young officers and petty officers doing all the training. They really know their material, you have got pretty good looking facilities and they are excited about what they do. It has been a great chance to see everything put together and I am really excited to brief Senator Duckworth on a lot of great stuff that is going on here.”

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