I__. - International Military Testing Association

In addition to SKTs and PFEs, USAFOMS produces USAF Supervisory Examinations
(USAFSEs) and Apprentice Knowledge Tests (AKTs). USAFSEs assess general
supervisory and managerial knowledges and are used in the Senior NC0 Promotion
Program, a board-based system used to make selections for promotion to
the ranks of senior master sergeant (E-8) and chief master sergeant (E-9).
AKTs measure the knowledge required for possession of the 3-skill level (also
called apprentice level> of training. An airman with documented civilian
experience in a specialty may be allowed to bypass resident technical training
with a passing score on the AKT, thus saving the Air Force valuable
training dollars.
In 1989, 700 SMEs were sent TDY to USAFOMS to develop a total of 418 tests.
The Professional Development Proqram
This program, though not strictly an outgrowth of the field of industrial
psychology like the others of USAFOMS, has had an important positive effect
on acceptance of USAFOMS’s promotion tests. It is Air Force policy that
promotion tests be developed entirely from references that will be available
to all examinees for study. Before 1980, this was a probiem with USAFOMS’s
most highly visible tests, the Promotion Fitness Examinations and USAF Supervisory
Examinations. These tests were written from a variety of references
which varied in quality and availability. The Professional Development
Program was established to develop a single, high-quality reference upon
which these critical promotion tests could be based.
The reference which evolved was Air Force Pamphlet 50-34. Volume I of the
pamphlet is now the sole source reference for airmen taking the Promotion
Fitness Exam to compete for promotion to staff sergeant, technical sergeant,
and master sergeant. Airmen competing for promotion to senior master ser-
geant and chief master sergeant study both Volume I and Volume II in preparing
to take the USAF Supervisory Exam.
The Occupational Analysis Proqram
In the early 196Os, research performed by the Air Force was to influence
profoundly the field of industrial psychology. Occupational analysis had
been around for many years in various forms, but it was the Comprehensive
Occupational Analysis Data Analysis Programs (collectively called CODAP)
developed by the Personnel Research Laboratory which made possible the study
of jobs on the scale necessary to work with career fields the scope of those
in the Air Force. In 1967, the Job Specialty Survey Division was formed to
apply this technology in the operational setting. It was part of what was
then called Lackland Military Training Squadron until Detachment 17 was
formed in 1970.
.People in the Occupational Analysis Program conduct surveys of AF personnel,
both military and civilian, to learn what tasks they do regularly on the job.
The Air Force uses the survey results for refining and maintaining occupational
structures within a classi+ication system, for constructing enlisted
promotion tests, for adjusting or establishing training programs, and for
sustaining or modifying other Air Force personnel and research programs. The
occupational survey process consists of six distinct phases, beginning with
the receipt of a request for an occupational survey. Requests for surveys
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