Sept. 23, 2004
Release No. 101

Families of high school seniors may get to stay in place
RANDOLPH AIR FORCE BASE, Texas – Sixty-three Air Force families with a child entering their senior year of high school this year will get to stay additional time at their current duty stations thanks to a recently implemented policy.

The High School Seniors Assignment Deferment Program allows senior master sergeants and below, and officers up through the rank of lieutenant colonel, to apply for a one-year assignment deferment.  Back-to-back deferments may be possible and military-married-to-military spouses may also apply.

Even with the changes, officials said the mission comes first and will be the overriding factor in granting deferments.

“Requests will be considered on a case-by-case basis,” said Col. Jennifer Hesterman, chief of assignment programs and procedures at the Air Force Personnel Center here. “There’s a balance between mission needs and helping our families, but our goal is to approve as many requests as possible. We’ll work with people as we always have. ”

To be eligible, the student must be a dependent of, and living with, the Airman requesting the deferment; he or she must also be enrolled in the Defense Department’s dependent enrollment system, according to Colonel Hesterman.

Officers may apply before they receive an assignment, and enlisted members may apply only after receiving an assignment, according to Master Sgt. Letty Inabinet, superintendent of assignment procedures and programs at AFPC.   

Application requests that cannot be supported initially by the assignment NCO or officer will be reviewed and validated by the respective AFPC assignment division chief for that Airman’s career field to ensure this is the right call for the member and the Air Force.      

Officials estimate that annually 20-25 percent of officers and senior non-commissioned officers have children entering their senior year of high school and, perhaps, one third of those could be eligible for assignment in a given year.

The recent policy change makes official what was already being done informally whenever possible in the past, according to Colonel Hesterman.

In some cases, assignments teams were already successfully working with Airmen to allow families stability when children were coming up on graduation, she said.

For more information or to complete an application, Airmen should contact either the local military personnel flight or their commander’s support staff.  

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