name is rebecca i'm the state senator of the thirty seventh legislative district in washington state and i just had the great honor to be interviewed by the washington african media association o diverse district it's very important to me that i am able to speak and reach all my constituents with accurate and timely information provides a great avenue it's so easy to come down to their offices and meet and get interviewed by amazing very committed community and media experts and professionals and and so i really highly recommend and that more folks should be accessing this great resource this public resource for our communities to be able to make sure that we're getting out the word and getting connected to our able to see many aviation opportunities and step programs and when we're it was visible that they were trying to work with the other people to make to show careers that career path in aviation they also showed us how to become a pilot ed we were able to interview lots of pilots and could it can believe scout who was a female pilot for alaska who was previously at the air force for many years but  or e mail us at info at m m r t i seattle dot org again there will be technology classes and you will be able to see our interviews with the pilots and  opportunity to see firsthand that this is a welcome for them if they want it it's there for them to achieve and they have to dedicate success my name is kimberly ford go by kim and i'm from right here in bellevue washington and currently i'm a seven thirty seven first officer for alaska airlines i've been with alaska for seventeen years i started my career in the u s air force i flew the k c one thirty five which is the refusal in plane and i also flew the c seventeen which is actually right behind me which is a cargo plane so i did bot fueling and cargo for the the air force i started out my career at the air force academy which is basically a way to get a free ride you get free education and free free flight training i was lucky that my father was an army lieutenant who could mentor me and give me some information i spent twenty five years in the air force i got to fly around the world got to achieve my dreams and then i'm really lucky that i got to when i was almost finished with that i joined the air force reserve after the active duty and did around afghanistan and iraq and at the same time i started working for alaska airlines so aviation is a great career there are a lot of different options in addition to being a pilots and i could talk about those later but if it's a career that you would like to do you courage you to go for it work hard we always talk about with my other mentees it's that desire and it's also the preparation so make sure you put that effort and the time and the training get your degree set you need and the biggest thing is stay out of trouble even anything small like a speeding ticket or anything like you know you can avoid that end of trouble keep it clean record and all the doors will be open to you so again i look forward to meeting with you all and working with you all and it's a pleasure to get to talk to you today thank you so much let's see it was it was a little bit challenging just because there are different diversity and gratian having women and people of color in leadership roles so i could roll into that and i knew that i would be treated respectfully but also for me i didn't have money for school and they paid for everything they paid for my four year undergraduate degree they paid for all of my training to fly and i think airplane they also gave me a graduate degree and then i got a pension and health care so i got everything i need if the air way they can right you have to serve a number of here so once you go through their pilot training they want you to serve at the time it was like eight years or something like that but basically to go from zero to be an airline pilot it takes about seven or eight years so all you have to do is system and turf you have to make sure you talk to the right recruiter and have a mentor make sure they get you in the right direction don't just like a list if you enlistees it's a more challenging to get out but if you talk to the officer recruiter and work with a mentor you can actually have a pathway to get your undergraduate or graduate degree and it could be also you can be a lawyer or a doctor they will pay for all of that and then it makes it easier for you to buy a house you have a pension me things that you guys really care about now but just think about it for later you know how you take care of yourself there are i think my minority pilots i'm trying to remember it's either like between three and five percent and then minority women pilots it's like less than one percent so the not there not very many of us one thing that i would suggest to you is that when you're coming into which you want to do aviation or any other job i would say remember who you are whether it's a religion or culturally or a language or just be who you are and be proud like i would always try to be like like i had some guys and just nothing wrong with country music or but you know so i would try to fit in and be be with them and try not to show my cultural aspects like who i am but then i learned that wait a minute this is this is who i am like if you get me you get this you know you get my family where i'm from what we the music we listen to so just keep that part of yourself because actually that's what makes you special that's what makes you who you are and then you're actually bringing a fresh perspective as a leader as a pilot as an engineer or whatever it may be and then also seek out organizations like their organizations with engineers or organizations with pilots tuskegee airmen or whatever join those organizations  like this one and then basically they get to a chance to chat and said to learn and to interface with other other folks like you you'll have people that want to challenge you because you're either a minority or a certain religion or whatever or where you're from or the way you speak or whatever but just remember that those people are ignorant and i mean some when you're in the environment just be professional do your job but don't let the person push that on you it's not your fault that they don't like it that you're a person of color or that you whatever your religion or your or your sexual orientation is not it's not your problem it's their problem so just be who you are and be strong and stuff like that those i think those are the biggest things that i have to say so if you guys interested in going to engineering or pilot or engineering awesome ok like work for like all of a sudden you're in shape and you don't really like i started out like i walked a lap and then i walked two laps and then i ran one of the i watch three and then and then like at you know four months you run a mile and it's two miles so somebody always told me she was like take care of the easy stuff so like for being a pilot you have to learn your emergency procedures and there are certain numbers you have to learn i don't know for engineering there's like certain basic things your fitness and everything if you practice out a little bit each day it comes time for your interview or to get into college or whatever you'll you'll know that you'll be in shape you'll know whatever numbers you're supposed to know so just make sure you work on your desired job a little bit a little b to stay in the timing of what you want to be  you do it and then you check to make sure it was done right you know so you do it and then you just check it again so analogous that's a skill that you feel like you have o c d but actually sometimes you actually make a mistake the first time like oh my god i didn't get that or i missed it or something like that so mean you know there's a lot of plays on there but i'm sure a phone not one yes but like i was telling you guys you know you hear it all the time rode out here from this big ball over here you guys can do whatever you want to do you give you whatever you want nobody nor should they i don't want you to flood airplanes you're not prepared and trained i don't want you fly my family around you're not ready he's got a question for air force twenty six  just said it was great you know i love serving serve my country for one of the airplanes that i've traveled all over the world all seven continents forty five countries all throughout asia and africa and antarctica and everywhere it was wonderful i loved it and i would trade it beside the flying you know what the military will do is instill discipline a structure there and you learn how to lead gives you leadership potential leadership skills things like that so i love it i wouldn't trade it for the world and if you are considering aviation if you're considering it the military is a great option a great offer you can see so much of cool stuff and fly state of the art aircraft to work with people functions of course one carries people one carries nothing you know different functions of your or your vehicle but they work about the same and what you learn intricacies in the limitations of each aircraft you can go from one to one or the other pretty easily yeah i've been to addison's one of the countries i've been to it was beautiful i do you know when you're not when you know goal you don't know what it's like you know but when i was there some of these lush green hills  that the ones that i named primarily ok oh i forgot australia and i forgot kuwait and i forgot new zealand all of those countries flew the sky high  this aircraft was to build it as light as possible so it could carry more stuff and sized stuff i mean by the fuel tanks as we have here is victory in a gallon fuel tank so when they're full they weigh about two thousand pounds hanging on the wing there's also could carry more stuff outboard of those we don't have the pylons attached but you could carry nine thousand pounds of munitions with this airplane probably as much as sather plane can carry so light strong capable maneuverable airplane really a fabulous airplane for  it depended on the mission i don't have the machine guns mounted but twenty millimeter machine guns and the wing wrote on the wings you can carry it actually carry the nuclear weapon  it never really did in war but it was designed to that's why you see the airplanes so i have to ground the nuclear bomb was a really short fat bomb and this is back in the cold war era back