Over the past year the Big Red One has carried quite a load, from combat training center rotations to extended tours in Poland amid the ongoing Ukraine crisis.
Alongside those deployments, the 1st Infantry Division had put extra emphasis on soldier families both near the unit’s stateside home in Fort Riley, Kansas and remotely, when necessary, as part of their “Year of the Family.”
That was always the plan.
Brig. Gen. Niave Knell told Army Times in a recent interview that extra effort was put into a host of family-focused and support-centered programs, activities, recognitions and other ways the unit could assist in a variety of areas.
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Over the past year, the unit has recognized more than 50 families. The awardees were selected by brigade command teams for individuals or groups who gave their personal time to make a positive impact in the community, officials said.
“You really can’t have a successful program in almost anything unless you have families that are willing to support, volunteer for everything from Boy Scout leaders, Cub Scout leaders to people who volunteer in Family Readiness Groups,” the division deputy commanding general-support said.
A main effort, Knell said, was to ensure that soldier families in need got the help they required, especially surrounding healthy living and nutrition.
To accomplish that, the unit provided classes on nutrition and food preparation. The focus was on items that were available at commissaries to give participants practical steps they could use immediately.
But fun has its place too.
The unit provided a spouse self-defense seminar, a couch to 5K race training, a fit family outdoor workout club and an obstacle course racing club, officials said.
And for both the families and the soldiers the unit paid special attention to added transition training and support, Knell said. Whether that was from soldiers coming home from overseas or long field training at a combat training center, which can be its own kind of adjustment.
“We also use military family life counselors,” Knell said. “Everybody does kind of a wellness check with the military family life counselor.”
That helps both soldiers and families take a moment to share any problems they have confidentially or seek support they might not know they needed.
Leadership took extra steps, she said, to ensure they shifted counselors to units in high demand.
Almost a kind of counselor “surge” that provided levels of assistance where they were needed most.
The family support and focus won’t go away, Knell said. But a new theme has emerged for the coming year, that’s the “Year of the NCO.”
The new recognition will focus on what’s often called the backbone of the Army – it’s noncommissioned officers.
The two pair together nicely, Knell said.
“It takes everybody behind that service member for the service member to be successful in the military,” she said.
Todd South has written about crime, courts, government and the military for multiple publications since 2004 and was named a 2014 Pulitzer finalist for a co-written project on witness intimidation. Todd is a Marine veteran of the Iraq War.
