NAVAL AIR SYSTEMS COMMAND, PATUXENT RIVER, Md. — In an effort to leverage the knowledge of NAVAIR’s senior scientists and engineers, Rear Adm. Mark Darrah, commander of the Naval Air Warfare Center Aircraft Division and NAVAIR’s assistant commander of Research and Engineering, recently asked the NAVAIR Fellows Program to develop a program to expand the presence of their expertise.   

Working through Robin Salanon, director of the Total Force Strategy and Management Department at Naval Air Warfare Center Aircraft Division, Naval Air Station (NAS) Patuxent River, Maryland, with support from the Fellows, the NAVAIR Fellows/Engineering Science Development Program (ESDP) Lecture Series commenced in April.

The NAVAIR Associate, Full and Esteemed Fellows are nationally recognized experts in areas critical to naval aviation. Associate Fellows represent the top 3 percent of the command’s 7,820 scientist and engineer population, Full Fellows the top 0.75 percent, and Esteemed Fellows the top 0.25 percent.

The lectures offer entry-level ESDP members, Acquisition Intern Program (AIP) members and others within the organization a chance to learn from NAVAIR Fellows about critical areas of naval research and engineering.

“Many of these employees are recently out of school and are not familiar with all that NAVAIR does,” said Stuart Altizer, a NAVAIR Associate Fellow and the first Fellow lecturer in the series. “ESDP rotation assignments and events like this lecture series provide great exposure to a variety of subjects.”

Kevin Walker, a recent graduate of AIP attended Altizer’s May 27 lecture on active electronically scanned array radar. “These lectures allow me to capture a portion of the knowledge available in the considerably more experienced NAVAIR Fellows,” said Walker, a radar systems engineer at Patuxent River, Maryland. “This reinforces my current skill set and prepares me to engage in a larger array of challenges with both a deeper and broader knowledge base.”

Capt. Robert Dishman, NAVAIR’s Integration and Interoperability Lead, kicked off the series with his “Delivering Integrated Warfare Capability (IWC)” brief. Subsequent lectures will be presented by NAVAIR Fellows. Lecture topics were requested and voted on by ESDP and AIP members. NAVAIR Fellows volunteered to present on topics in their area of expertise.

With topics established through fiscal 2014 and the fiscal 2015 schedule in development, one lecture will be held per month. Video teleconferencing will be available, so employees across NAVAIR’s nine geographically separated organizations can participate, officials said. The next event, “Mathematics Statistics: Apply Bayesian Statistics on Uncertainty Evaluation Due to Incomplete Information” is scheduled June 23 at NAS Patuxent River.

Upcoming lectures

WHEN: 1-3 p.m. EST, June 23

TITLE: “Mathematics Statistics: Apply Bayesian Statistics on Uncertainty Evaluation Due to Incomplete Information” by Ding Huang

LOCATION: Employee Development Center, Building 2189, Room 120 and video teleconferencing (VTC), Naval Air Station (NAS) Patuxent River, Md.

WHEN: 1-2:30 p.m. EST, July 21

TITLE: “Stability and Control, Flying Qualities, Flight Controls Test and Evaluation” by Mike Mosher

LOCATION:  Employee Development Center, Building 2189, Room 120 and VTC, NAS Patuxent River

WHEN: 1-:230 p.m. EST, Aug. 18

TITLE: “Warfare Analysis” by Jim DeSanti

LOCATION: Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake, Calif., and VTC (NAS Patuxent River via VTC: Employee Development Center, Building 2189, Room 120)

WHEN: 10:30 a.m. to noon EST, Sept. 29

TITLE: “Future Aircraft Carrier Design and Operations” by Christian Utara and Warren Baker

LOCATION: Employee Development Center, Building 2189, Room 120 and VTC, NAS Patuxent River.

Employees may register for Fellows Lecture Series events by obtaining supervisory approval and then sending an email request to [email protected], copying their supervisor. Contractor personnel are not eligible to attend at this time, organizers said.