BALTDEFCOL hosted a NATO Defence Education Enhancement Programme Non-Commissioned Officers Drafting Workshop

Last week, the Baltic Defence College (BALTDEFCOL) hosted a NATO Defence Education Enhancement Programme (DEEP) Non-Commissioned Officers (NCO) Drafting Workshop, which gathered 17 subject matter experts from NATO member states and partner nations in person and 3 virtually, including a Ukrainian Team member who joined work online from his country torn by ongoing Russian aggression. Altogether 13 nations were represented.  

The aim of this workshop was to continue drafting an NCO Instructor Development Reference Curriculum. The practical result of this workshop will be a booklet that will describe a system of preparing instructors of NCO education institutions (NCO Academies, Schools) with a Basic Instructor Level,  Advanced Instructor Level, and Master Instructor Level programs. “It is a tool which could help nations establish, transform, or improve their system of preparing instructors,” said Sergeant Major Ludek Kolesa. 

To the question, of how NCOs’ education will be changed during the following five years, Sergeant Major Ludek Kolesa answered that the working team aims to promote instructor exchange programs and he believes that in a few years we will have more multinational mobile training teams and more cooperation between NCO-schools. 

SGM Ludek Kolesa also expressed his gratitude towards BALTDEFCOL for hosting the 4th Drafting Workshop and highlighted that most of the team visited Estonia for the first time and truly enjoyed their time in Tallinn and Tartu. 

BALTDEFCOL has been involved with NCOs’ Professional Military Education for the last three years. In 2019, BALTDEFCOL conducted the first Command Senior Enlisted Leaders’ Course (CSELC), and it has been a huge success. The evidence of the increasing interest in the Course is the fact that the number of participating Senior NCOs and sending nations has significantly raised compared to the Pilot Course. From 2022, the CSELC will be officially one of BALTDEFCOL’s core courses.