Navy Assistant Secretary Attends RTC’s PIR

Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Manpower & Reserve Affairs, the Honorable Juan Garcia III, visited Recruit Training Command (RTC) to tour and attend the weekly Pass-In-Review (PIR) recruit graduation, Aug. 15.

Garcia served as the reviewing officer at the ceremony and witnessed nine divisions, 713 seaman recruits in total, enter the fleet as basically trained Sailors.

As Assistant Secretary of the Navy, Garcia acts on matters pertaining to manpower and personnel policy within the Department of the Navy including issues affecting active duty and reserve Sailors, Marines and civilians.

Rear Adm. Annie Andrews, commander, Navy Recruiting Command (NRC) and former commanding officer of RTC, also attended the PIR in the Midway Ceremonial Drill Hall. Rear Adm. Richard Brown, commander, Naval Service Training Command (NSTC) and Capt. Doug Pfeifle, the commanding officer of RTC also attended the PIR. The special guest for the ceremony was New Zealand Naval Attache Cmdr. Sean Stewart.

Forty-eight graduations are held each year to celebrate the accomplishments of recruits who have completed all training requirements.

Garcia and Andrews also spoke at the Navy Recruiting Command’s Leadership Symposium that assembled all senior leaders from the 26 Navy Recruiting Districts (NRD), the Recruiting School (NORU) and headquarters. The theme for the symposium was; Supporting Recruiters, Working Smarter, Making Mission. The symposium provided a forum to clearly communicate long term strategic challenges and promises to have both an immediate and lasting positive impact on the recruiting mission and quality of life for the recruiting nation.

RTC is primarily responsible for conducting the initial Navy orientation and training of new recruits. The command is commonly referred to as boot camp or recruit training.