GIVING BACK

interest in CAP early on and kept
me going through my Mitchell
award.”
After Kelly moved to Colorado in
2003, Lt. Col. Barbara Gentry
rekindled his interest in the cadet
program. “I hadn’t tested in a year,
and I wasn’t sure I wanted to continue
in the program,” Kelly admitted.
“The squadron she ran just sucked
me back in. It is the legacy of the
Gentrys. The squadron they built
really inspired me to go on and seek
out a military career of service and
excellence.”
Kelly’s secret for success in
the Cadet Program involves a
positive form of peer pressure
and surrounding himself with
cadets who have achieved
more than he has. “This way
I always feel I am playing
catch-up, and it motivates me
like crazy,” he said. “I even
have a few Spaatzen friends.
After I passed my Spaatz, I
felt relieved more than anything.”
CAP’s leadership lessons
have also influenced Kelly.
“I’ve gotten more experience
than most adults on how to
lead,” he said. “I’m to the point
where I can lead confidently in
almost any situation.” He also prizes
the confidence he has picked up
along the way. “To know I can lead
a team to accomplish a goal is very
comforting,” he said.
A variety of leadership opportunities
have solidified his leadership
skills — at Cadet Officer School in
2005, as a member of the Training
and Planning Staff at the Colorado
Wing Encampment in 2006, as a
Photo by Jim Tynan, CAP National Headquarters
chair of the Colorado Wing Cadet
Advisory Council and as the Rocky
Mountain Region representative to
the National Cadet Advisory
Council. He joined his elite peers
from across the nation at the Civic
Leadership Academy in Washington,
D.C., in March.
Kelly’s favorite major CAP cadet
activity so far has been the
International Air Cadet Exchange
program, which gave him the opportunity
in 2005 to tour the Royal Air
Force in Great Britain and become
an honorary Belgian. “Getting to
Cadet Col. Michael A. Kelly, center, is presented the Gen.
Carl A. Spaatz Award by CAP National Commander Maj.
Gen. Antonio J. Pineda, left, and Ret. Air Force Lt. Gen. Nick
Kehoe, former chairman of the CAP Board of Governors.
know our British allies better while
at the same time getting to know
cadets from such countries as
Belgium, Turkey, India and Australia
was probably the biggest privilege
I’ve ever had,” he said.
Kelly’s multifaceted CAP experiences
have put him on the fast track
in ROTC, as he has more familiarity
with military customs than most
cadets. “I can now focus on being a
quality cadet,” he said.
The difference shows. In ROTC,
Kelly is ranked among the top
cadets in his class, and recently he
was given a prestigious wing staff job
in his detachment, as General
Military Course advisor for the
semester, roughly analogous to a
command chief. “We report to the
wing commander regarding issues
with the underclassmen and aid in
their proper training,” Kelly said.
“It’s a prestigious position that
almost every future cadet wing commander
has held.”
Kelly notices the difference selfdiscipline
has made in his life.
“Especially at college where
nobody tells you to do anything,
except in ROTC, it can
be very hard to stay on task
and push things through to
completion,” he said. “The
self-discipline I learned
through CAP has helped me
stay on task and prioritize my
responsibilities.”
Kelly gained the self-discipline
to shelve, at least for the
time being, his musical ambitions,
which blossomed at
about the same time he discovered
CAP. Kelly joined the
Illinois Wing’s Thunder
Composite Squadron in 2000 and
started playing guitar the same year.
In 2002, he joined a blues-rock jam
band, Break Away, as lead guitarist,
and his band won second place in
his high school’s Battle of the
Bands.
“I still play. I still own four guitars,
but the most I’ve done with it
since moving to Colorado was being
president of the Guitar Club at my
high school during my senior year,”
he said. ▲
U.S. Civil Air Patrol Volunteer 31 July-August 2007