Colorado Politics

Space policy expert named Air Force Academy commandant

A top space policy expert will be the next commandant of cadets at the United States Air Force Academy, the Pentagon announced Thursday.

Brig. Gen. Michele Edmondson, who oversees space policy for the National Security Council, will take over this summer from Brig. Gen. Kristin Goodwin. It is the first time that women have served back-to-back in the role, which oversees the daily life of the Colorado Springs school’s 4,000 cadets.

Goodwin, a B-2 bomber pilot who came to the academy in 2017, is headed to the Pentagon, where she will serve in operations and planning.

A University of Florida graduate, Edmondson spent much of her Air Force career in space assignments, including tours at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs and Buckley Air Force Base in Aurora.

In 2014, she stepped away from satellites and rockets to lead the Air Force’s basic training program at Lackland Air Force Base. In that job, she was responsible for turning as many as 6,000 recruits at a time into airmen.

“This is terrific news,” Academy Superintendent Lt. Gen. Jay Silveria said in a statement. “We wish General Edmondson and her family the best as she prepares to take charge of our number one resource: our cadets.”

Edmondson also knows more than how to teach recruits how to march: She led the Air Force’s technical training operation at Mississippi’s Keesler Air Force Base, overseeing schooling for 12,000 airmen.

She took the space policy job in August, helping set the Trump administration’s stance on space issues as the president escalated his push for a separate Space Force.

Michele C. Edmondson
Photo via basictraining.af.mil.

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