When John Lewis explains that he’s a liaison officer with the Joint Warfare Analysis Center (JWAC), it’s easy to believe. At a buff six feet, he has the physical presence that would surely come in handy during a deployment to Afghanistan. Yet, it is John’s advanced degrees in electrical engineering that landed him in a warzone. Back in Dahlgren, VA he is vague on the details of his job – those are classified – but offers this guarded explanation: “We help war fighters solve very hard problems using math, engineering, data and intelligence.” As a liaison officer, John says he translates engineering “geek speak” into more manageable terminology for soldiers.
While John won’t divulge details about his assignments at JWAC, what he will tell you is how pleased he is with the education he received at Reynolds. “I’m a community college guy. That’s how I started. I took vocational classes in high school, and plenty of study halls. I didn’t plan on going to college, but my time in the National Guard proved to me that I could do hard things. I decided to enroll at J. Sarge, and it was the best thing I could have done.”
Using his G.I. Bill, Pell grants, and “every scholarship I could apply for” John began on a different kind of adventure. He credits the basic-level course offerings, small class sizes and, particularly, the interest of the professors with much of his success. “One of my professors told me that I had picked up electronics so well that I should consider becoming an engineer.” Which he did; after earning his associate’s degree in ‘95, John transferred to Virginia Tech to earn his bachelor’s degree in engineering. “When I first got to Tech, I was pretty nervous. You know, could I compete with these Tech students? But, with what I’d learned at Reynolds, I was so well prepared, it was incredible. I finished with a 3.97 GPA. I think I had one B+ my entire time. And, this is from someone who had started at Reynolds taking remedial Algebra 1.”
Eventually, he would earn his master’s in engineering, but John can still quote formulas he learned at the College in Dr. M.L. Foy’s physics class. “She was one of the most thorough and best professors I’ve ever had in any university I’ve attended. Dr. Foy taught concepts beyond the abstract. These were real world examples we learned.” Examples that he applies to the classified operations of JWAC: “Ultimately, we’re using science to win wars.”
