Team Vance gears up for Wingman Day

  • Published
  • 71st FTW Public Affairs
VANCE AIR FORCE BASE, Okla. --  Team Vance will conduct Wingman Day from Oct. 14 to 31.

The theme of this Wingman Day is "Team Building," said Maggie Laws, the community support coordinator and Wingman Day organizer. According to surveys, the largest single stressor at Vance is work place related, and for this Wingman Day units will be focusing on creating unit cohesion.

Along with team building exercises, which Laws promises will be fun, there will be a suicide prevention briefing, a resiliency video and another round of Story Tellers.

Units here can pick any date during the three-week time frame authorized by the Col. Clark Quinn, the 71st Flying Training Wing commander, said Laws. That is the longest of any Wing in Air Education and Training Command.

"We wanted to give the Groups maximum flexibility to ensure Wingman Day would be impactful," she said. "(Base) leadership talked about it and decided that if we were going to have 200 plus people holed up for three hours then the event needed to be entertaining. People's time is valuable and we don't want to waste it."

To avoid this waste, Laws will provide 24 new team building activities that squadrons can choose from to accomplish the team-building portion of Wingman Day. Activities include Chuck the Chicken, Minefield, Mass Pass, Stepping Stones and Running Man.

The types of team-building games used will be determined by squadron commanders and resilience training assistants. Each game will include at least one of the eleven skills of resilience.

The Air Force is always looking to improve resilience, said Laws. Each time Vance participates in a Wingman Day the community support coordinator sends surveys to people in each squadron. The responses are used to plan the next Wingman Day.

"We know that some folks don't like to participate in Wingman Day activities," said Laws. "That's why we ask people to fill out surveys. Their feedback allows us to improve the next Day."

Surveys will be sent out within 24 hours of a squadron's completion of Wingman Day activities.