An abbreviated blueprint for the mission-focused modernization of academics at USAFA

USAFA can step forward, or it can step backward, it can not remain as it was.

[Pardon the terseness of this post. A version with a more complete explanation and justification is available here.]

America’s Air Force Academy is in crisis, due to ongoing crippling cuts of its knowledgeable civilian/veteran faculty, justified by SecDef Hegseth to somehow (?) make it “less woke”.

In this time of crisis comes an opportunity to renew. To maximize USAFA’s warfighting relevance while maintaining academic excellence in light of the spring 2025 permanent cuts of over 50 of its best long-term civilian/veteran faculty, significant refocusing is necessary. Continuing all existing USAFA majors in a mediocre fashion, with insufficient experienced faculty, is a nonstarter.

Hard choices must be made. Below are some specific recommendations to accomplish this refocusing, for public debate before any further decisions are made. [Note: related Air Force Specialty Codes are indicated below in parentheses. Undergraduate Pilot Training candidates are drawn from all majors, and are not mentioned further below.]

1. Eliminate the English, Math, Meteorology, and Philosophy majors due to insufficient enrollment and weak military relevance.

2. Mothball the Chemistry major, for now; to instead grow this important major requires too expensive an infrastructure at USAFA in the present fiscal environment. Freshmen classes in Chemistry, English, Math, Physics and Engineering must continue unabated.

3. Bolster the Physics major; the USAF must remain a leader in directed energy weapons, etc. (61D)

4. Combine Foreign Area Studies, History, Political Science, Economics, and Geospatial Science into a new World Conflicts major focused on the development and prevention of wars, analyzing the historical, religious, political, and economic connections and distinctions, and the natural resources, related to the alliances and hostilities between nations, and hotspots related to them (Taiwan, Crimea, Gaza, Kashmir, …), thus preparing officers to work in both leadership and Intelligence (14N).

5. Combine the Aero and Mech departments, which overlap (computational modeling, analysis, & design; thermodynamics; structural materials; fatigue & failure; …). Eliminate the Mech major. The USAF and USSF are responsible for aircraft and spacecraft (not household widgets, nor IndyCars); USAFA engineering must be similarly focused. (62E, 11E)

6. Keep Astro standalone. Topics covered include space domain awareness, dynamics, orbital mechanics, control theory, etc. With very different customers and courses of study, the Aero and Astro departments at USAFA are a poor fit to be combined; the challenges of working in air and working in space are as different as the challenges of working on the ocean and working in air. At USAFA, Aero and Astro demand focused, individual attention. (62E)

7. Form an EECS department responsible for the EE and CS majors and, working closely with Aero and Astro, a new interdisciplinary Autonomous Systems major focused on Drones, Collaborative Combat Aircraft, etc, which are redefining how nations fight, surveil, geolocate, and communicate. (62E, 17X)

8. Eliminate the Cyber Science major. Form a new Cyberspace Operations department responsible for the Data Science and Operations Research majors, focused on parsing massive amounts of data, and discovering and acting upon opportunities and threats hidden within. (17X, 14N, 15A)

9. Maintain the Military Strategic Studies major. Emphasis areas include real-time battlespace management of American and Allied forces. (12X, 13B/C/D)

10. Maintain majors in Biology (43E) and Behavioral Science (61B), overseen by a single department.

11. Keep Civil and Environmental engineering standalone, focused on planning, designing, and maintaining runways, hangars, etc. (32E)

12. Form an Acquisitions Management department overseeing the Management and Systems Engineering majors, including agile project management, responding to new threats and incorporating new technologies in weeks instead of decades, and government reference architectures, preventing vendor lock in the lifecycle of new systems. (63A, ​​64P)

13. Bolster Legal Studies. M\ilitary leaders must think critically, identifying when and how to report previously unseen opportunities and possible missteps, and how to dissent properly to orders that are illegal, unethical, or significantly harmful to meeting mission. Further, deploying new autonomous weapons requires codification of the Rules of Engagement in any given conflict, and the right levels of human oversight, which requires significant scrutiny. (51J)

14. Focus the available minors on learning the Languages of our potential adversaries, including Mandarin, Russian, Farsi, Arabic, Korean, and Spanish, eliminating French and German. Recruit several candidates yearly who are fluent in such languages before arriving at USAFA; reward cadets militarily for fluency. (14N)

15. Consistent with the SecDef’s goal of reducing the number of general officers, the current Supt voluntarily “takes his own DRP” from USAFA, the current Vice Supt is promoted to Supt, and the Vice Supt position is converted to that of a civilian veteran of the Academy appointed by the ARDI foundation. [The Supt and Dean positions remain those of general officers.] This leadership change brings an independent, education-orientated perspective, with a focus on transparency and accessibility, to the Supt’s Office.

The recommendations stated above provide an efficient, mission-relevant restarting point for USAFA. They appear to be decidedly different from the plans currently being drafted, which are still conspicuously concealed from USAFA stakeholders under NDA. Our perspective is that open debate is key to maximizing stakeholder buy-in and institutional success. Other leading universities with vibrant AFROTC programs cover the academic majors eliminated by such a plan, which is some consolation. Such refocusing provides a path forward to operate USAFA “far, far above” its academic and military competitors with the loss of faculty already suffered.

Between 50 and 100 additional cuts (!!) of long-term faculty are now being planned, to reach an arbitrary target of an 80/20 mil/civ faculty mix; this would require further massive reductions of majors and mothballing of facilities, and would call into question USAFA’s viability as an institution capable of drawing America’s brightest students and faculty. We do not see a viable path forward for USAFA if that happens. We must “aim higher” than simply accreditation of our remaining majors.

Even with the staggering losses that it already endured, the level of world-class veteran talent still on the USAFA faculty is remarkable. We must halt their ongoing decimation, pivot, bolster where necessary, and build on our strengths to re-establish USAFA as America’s premier forward-looking military academy.

[To comment on this proposed blueprint, please head over to the full version of this post, available here.]