JBER technical sergeant wins Air Force Cyber Warrior of the Year Award

  • Published
  • By Airman 1st Class Jack Sanders
  • JBER Public Affairs
JOINT BASE ELMENDORF-RICHARDSON, Alaska --  Tech. Sgt. Ryan Barkman, 611th Air Communications Squadron, won the 2010 Air Force level Cyber Warrior of the Year for cyber systems operations.

According the Air Force Specialty Code description, cyber systems operations is responsible system administration on command, control, communications computer and intelligence systems.

The cyber warrior of the year was broken down into specific career fields, with the award package breaking down even further to three categories pertaining to his career field.
"I remember two of the three categories were community involvement and education aspects pertaining to the job," Barkman said.

Barkman knocked the education section out by completing the extensive Microsoft Certified Information Technology Professional courses specializing in server administration and enterprise administration.

"It's a true blue boot camp, and he was one of four people out of 25 or 26 people who actually paced all certifications the first time around, and I can vouch for how hard it is because I went to the fast passed class later and I missed one exam," said Mr. Donald Pettit, 611th ACOMS. "It was very, very hard, but it helps him do his
job."

"He's dedicated, I mean if you give him a task it's almost fire and forget - you're just waiting for him to come back and tell you, 'Hey I did it.' or, 'Here's the product,' depending on what was asked of him," said Master Sgt. Devlin Huffman, 611 ACOMS. "He's motivated and self-sufficient."

Barkman said he believes a large portion of what went into helping him win this award was deploying to Al Udeid earlier in the year.

"The level of real-world missions that are going on over there and the constant tempo of stuff that's going on just provided a lot of experience," Barkman said.

"Mission comes first, but my mindset is to come to work every day and enjoy myself," Barkman said. "Have fun, I like the people I work with, I like my job and we work in a great squadron."