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CSAF recognizes Reserve Command staff members

  • Published
  • By Sean P. Houlihan
  • Air Force Reserve Command headquarters

Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown, Jr. recognized three members of the Air Force Reserve Command headquarters staff for their achievements during his visit here Feb. 8.

Brown presented his chief of staff coin and shared a COVID-safe elbow bump with Lee Ricker, Directorate of Manpower, Personnel and Services, Tech. Sgt. Kristen Zavoda, Surgeon General’s Office, and Tech. Sgt. Mark Christensen, Directorate of Cyberspace and Technology, after thanking each of them for their hard work and asking them what was the biggest hurdle to accomplishing their tasks.

As an operations research analyst, Ricker is responsible for transforming raw data through scientific and mathematical analytics into actionable decision support products for senior leaders. He is helping reform the organization by linking a $2.2 billion fiscal execution to shared data environment and readiness indicators.

Also, he assisted in Defense Department data proliferation by advising the command’s chief of information and the data board on the development of governance adopted by the Department of the Air Force. And, he developed the first financial management dashboard with real-time fiscal oversight and performance metrics to inform commander decisions across 45 wings.

Zavoda is a medical logistician on long-term orders working all medical logistics issues for the COVID-19 pandemic. She placed the first order of the COVID-19 vaccine for first responders and verified numbers for more than 74,000 Reservists and civilians in the command.

She worked tirelessly to solve short-notice tasking personal protective equipment problems and provided long-term solutions to avoid the same issues in the future. Zavoda also established critical relationships with the Air Force Medical Readiness Agency COVID vaccine cell to ensure constant and variable access to vaccine shipments to all command Reserve Medical Units.

Christensen safeguards, sustains and administers classified and unclassified networks for more than 74,000 users at 61 locations across the command. He led the classified network tiger team for the 94th Airlift wing and 22nd Air Force that restored two total base outages while training eight members to sustain future network operations.

As the command’s computer security representative, he updated 84 cryptologic certificates and maintained 120 assets. During a Department of the Air Force inspection, his program had zero findings. Christensen was instrumental in expanding the command’s virtual environment during the COVID-19 pandemic with capabilities increasing 10-fold to more than 18,000 users Air Force-wide.