Youth tour aims to attract ACEs into all trades, interests
Karly Shields sketched her way through the presentations by an air traffic controller, aerospace engineer, pilot and air operations support technician. She sketched her way across a hangar floor of aviation work displays, and then through three of 14 Wing Greenwood’s military aircraft. A few aircraft flew overhead: she sketched those, too.
“This is my book – just any planes I’ve seen, ones I look at,” she said April 16, during a break at the 14 Wing Greenwood-hosted Elevate Aviation ACE on Tour youth open house. Shields is an Avon View High School student and a second-year, Level 3 Cadet with the 106 Windsor Regional Royal Canadian Air Cadet Squadron.
“I’m looking at aerospace engineering – working on planes, or space,” Shields said. Her hand-folded, F18 fighter paper airplane, made at one of the activity tables; was quickly snapped up by one of the day’s 14 Wing volunteers.
Over 80 12- to 18-year-old youth attended a full day of briefs, displays, aircraft static tours and hangar hands-on activities, tripling the number from the wing’s first ACE on Tour event in 2024. They came from Cadet units, middle and high schools, Girl Guide groups and as individuals – all curious to hear about aviation-related careers: the pay, the education, the benefits, the challenges and the fun. While Shields is exactly the kind of youth Elevate Aviation encourages to pursue a career in aviation, the “aviation career exploration” behind the ACE acronym is an opportunity for, particularly, girls and under-represented youth to also see aviation career doors open in photography, ground support, art, sales, instructing, firefighting, commercial flying – and, yes, even space.
14 Wing Greenwood Colonel Luc Vachon welcomed event youth, describing how his own youthful love of planes was fired by an “outstanding, so amazing, insane” Snowbirds’ performance at an air show. In high school, he joined the Canadian Armed Forces Reserves as an army medic, working through the summers to become a health care officer. Considering the military full-time after graduation, a recruiter friend asked him if he’d ever considered becoming a pilot.
“There was a fighter pilot helmet on a shelf behind her – ‘That’s what I want to do! Let’s take the risk, try something new, see if it works!’” Vachon said. “I did the aircrew selection process, and I didn’t pass – it was first time I’d ever failed anything. But – I qualified as a navigator. They fly. And, my path made me all the way to where I’m at because I failed as a pilot. I dedicated myself in other ways, and I’ve loved it.”
Vachon’s command team partner, Wing Chief Warrant Officer Justin Harper, in his welcome, described how, after six years of retail and delivery work after high school, he saw a helicopter fly overhead, walked into a Canadian Armed Forces recruiting centre and became an aviation systems technician.
“I love this stuff: complex systems, taking engines apart, being a part of the most technologically advanced systems in the world. I’ve been you, and you’re going to grow up and be me. Take every opportunity – aviation is an awesome career path.”
Some of those career paths were on display throughout the event, with military recruiting and aviation industry representatives on hand to talk about technical trades, computer simulation, flight training, design and testing, manufacturing and more. While 14 Wing hosted, with an emphasis on aviation careers with military aircraft, almost all trades have a civilian industry counterpart. IMP Group, PAL Aerospace and the Annapolis Valley Flight Training School all, in fact, have an operational footprint at 14 Wing.
For more on Elevate Aviation and its education, outreach and mentorship programs, visit elevateaviation.ca
