Teen discusses representing Fairchild, AMC, more on Air Force Teen Council

Published April 14, 2011
By Airman 1st Class Earlandez M. Young
92nd Air Refueling Wing

FAIRCHILD AIR FORCE BASE, Wash. -- "To me, being able to represent what we as teens believe in is a privilege," said the Fairchild AFB high school freshman who was named a member of Air Mobility Command's Teen Council in December.

Marina Hill, a student at Cheney High School, said it's a huge honor to know that out of all the Fairchild teens she was selected. Each Air Force installation is establishing an installation teen council with a single teen representative to represent at the major command level.

"It feels good to know they're counting on me to tell leadership things that we'd like done," Ms. Hill said.

The goal of the councils are to increase and improve communication between Air Force teens and leadership, cultivate an environment of civic leadership among teen members, increase relevancy of youth programs in teens' lives and initiate change, which will improve quality of life for Air Force youth and teens.

"Anytime she's here at the teen center, she is willing to help out," said Camila Flowers, Fairchild AFB's teen center program manager. "She has also brought people here to increase our membership. She's a good outreach. She's one of those people, who is always happy and bubbly and really gets everyone excited about something and encourages others to get involved."

Marina's father, Col. Michael S. Hill, 92nd Mission Support Group commander, is elated that Marina was selected as Fairchild's representative for the Air Force Teen Council.

"I'm extremely proud of Marina," said Colonel Hill. "She's a hard worker and like me, has a mission to complete while here at Fairchild."

Over the past six months, Marina has been a very active student by participating in many activities such as student council, which she served as president. Tina M. Hill, Marina's mother, says Marina has always had leadership abilities.

"I'm very proud of her accomplishment. Marina has always been a leader in a sense," said Mrs. Hill. "She's a very well-balanced independent young-woman, who is going to be a great leader some day."

Marina says as the Air Force Council representative she has a lot of upcoming projects and events planned and looks forward to teens coming out to have some fun.

"Every two weeks, I meet with other kids who are on the teen council and right now we are working on our main project, which is bridging the gap between the two schools," Marina said. "We are trying to get Medical Lake and Cheney High School to meet and come together over Spring Break. "

To do this, they scheduled a different event each day of Spring Break. April 8 was the main event, a lock-in at Spokane's Laser Quest. Mrs. Hill says the teen center has done and is continuing to do some amazing things for Fairchild teens, and their after-school care assists a lot of families here by watching kids after school.

"The teen center is a great opportunity for kids," said Mrs. Hill. "The teen center offer some amazing things and most parents probably don't know that they do, so I highly encourage new comers to Fairchild to enroll their children into the teen center.

"Some of the kids have may have moved 10 or 15 times because of their parents being in the military, so it's a great place for them to go and meet other military kids who has gone through the same scenario."

For Marina, being part of organizations like the teen center was a large factor in helping her adjust to Fairchild.

"Marina has developed some great skills," said Coronel Hill. "She has been moving around the world year after year because of me being in the Air Force, so she has to adapt to all these different kids and environments everywhere she goes and does a good job at it.

"She's such a strong and dedicated individual. She plays sports; she's involved in other school activities and now is the representative for the Air Force Teen Council and while participating in all these different activities she still manages to excel at a high standard in school. I think she has the drive to do this because of her coming from an Air Force family and seeing all the obstacles we go through as a family," said Colonel Hill, who added Marina won the Air Mobility Command Youth of the Year Award.

Tom Stralser, who is Marina's track and field coach at Cheney High School isn't surprised of Marina's accomplishments.

"Marina is a great student," said Mr. Stralser. "She's the type of student athelete we like to have. She's very involved and is a tremendous student. We love the way she is representing us as a high school."

"We're looking for more members to be a part of our Air Force Teen Council," Marina said. "Anybody can join and give their advice and suggestions, because that's what we're looking for. We want to take the council up and above so that we can present our ideas to high leadership and be heard."