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MANNHEIM, Germany — The leadership of the 630th Military Police Company, 709th Military Police Battalion gathered representatives from agencies of U.S. Army Garrison-Schweinfurt and USAG-Bamberg for two days of pre-deployment presentations April 5 and 6 in Bamberg and Schweinfurt, Germany, for the Soldiers and families of the 630th MP Co. in preparation for the unit’s movement to Afghanistan in the coming weeks.
The agencies represented at the company’s “rodeo” were there to “give a face to the names of agencies that each community has access to,” which will be a vital asset to families when their Soldiers deploy, said Mary Hill, Family Readiness Group leader for the 630th MP Co.
While its Soldiers are deployed, the rear detachment leadership for the 630th MP Co. wants to make sure the families have the information and resources they will need to make the best of their Soldier’s deployment.
Travis Reynolds, outreach coordinator for USAG-Schweinfurt, told the Soldiers and families gathered at the Conn Club on Conn Barracks in Schweinfurt that there are new challenges that arise every time a Soldier deploys.
Whether a Soldier is going through his first deployment or has deployed
multiple times, Mr. Reynolds told them, “the message we want to leave you with is to not just survive, but to thrive during this deployment.”
For 1st Lt. Michael Robey, the rear detachment commander of the 630th MP Co., that is exactly what he wants to provide families with — an opportunity to thrive. The event was a chance to make sure families and Soldiers had an opportunity to hear information that was important to them first-hand from the agencies themselves.
What happens a lot of times is that a Soldier will be briefed on multiple things and will take only the information that’s relevant to him or her. The family will end up missing out on something. The 630th MP Co.’s rodeo was an opportunity to fill that information gap that sometimes occurs, First Lieutenant Robey said.
After each agency gave a short briefing to the Soldiers and families as a whole, they then posted themselves at individual stations where they had laid out brochures and flyers and made themselves available to answer questions and provide information.
Personal readiness consultants like Jamie Armstrong from USAG-Schweinfurt were also made available to each Soldier and family to make sure, as Ms. Armstrong said, “they’ve got all their ducks in a row before they go downrange.” Families went over a comprehensive checklist with a consultant to make sure details, big and small, were covered before their Soldier deployed.
“It’s things you might not think about before a deployment,” Ms. Armstrong pointed out, “important things that you should be thinking about but might not with everything else going on.”
The checklists, pamphlets and information the Soldiers and families were provided with were there to cover all the bases and bring up questions or events that might not have been covered yet.
“It’s our first deployment so this was really helpful” said Elizabeth Poindexter, the expectant wife of Cpl. Joshua Poindexter, a team leader with the 630th MP Co., as they got information from the Red Cross booth after the pre-deployment presentation.
Overall, the two days of presentations met their intent and provided families with an opportunity to speak to dozens of representatives from their community in preparation for the unit’s upcoming deployment and their spouse’s departure.
The 709th MP Bn.’s family readiness support assistant, Cheri Smith, said the plan is to maintain the flow of information that was started at the rodeo and continue to assist families once their Soldiers deploy through the use of e-mails, unit events and social media.
By providing Soldiers and families with this opportunity, it makes for less anxiety for families prior to deployment and allows them to focus on their most precious resource — their Soldiers.
