An airman recently became the first female survival, evasion, resistance, escape, or SERE, specialist to achieve the rank of chief master sergeant, the service announced.
Chief Master Sgt. Tiffany Zaloudek earned the highest enlisted rank in the Air Force on Nov. 1, according to an Air Force release.
Zaloudek earned her SERE beret in 2007, becoming the first woman in eight years to finish the specialized course.
But her path was filled with doubters along the way.
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She said the recruiter for the course supplied her with a SERE brochure devoid of any images of women and didn’t exactly offer his support, Zaloudek recalled in the release.
“He told me that he only knew of one woman to ever graduate SERE specialist training and that I didn’t look like the type who would do this job because I was so feminine,” Zaloudek said. “I understood SERE was a demanding career path, but I felt I was ready for the challenge.”
She chalked up his incorrect assessment of her grit to his knowledge that she’d owned a pet rabbit in the past.
The joke was on him.
Nearly a decade later, she was the one teaching airmen in the woods how to skin a rabbit.
SERE specialists provide service members with essential knowledge on how to find food, make shelter, hide from enemies and engineer their own rescue.
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In the early stages of her training, Zaloudek was mocked as a “Combat Barbie,” but she paid the jeers no mind, maintaining tunnel vision on her goal to never quit, according to the release.
Eight years later, she achieved her goal and graduated as a top performer in her class.
Even after becoming a SERE specialist though, Zaloudek said some people weren’t able to look beyond her gender and misjudged her.
Individuals mischaracterized her outgoing personality as a form of weakness, she said.
Zaloudek responded by acting more reserved, becoming more stoic and flattening her character to blend in, the release notes.
She said she’s spoken to other women in the services who have experienced a similar watering down of their identity as a response to inaccurate accusations that their success is attributed to their gender or looks.
Zaloudek eventually emerged from this protective cocoon and reclaimed her outgoing identity.
Now she’s a chief master sergeant.
“To all the women out there, please know that strength and femininity go hand-in-hand,” Zaloudek said, adding that success in a male-dominated career doesn’t require conforming to gender stereotypes.
“I personally like wearing makeup and doing my hair; that doesn’t make me less of a SERE specialist. And for those who prefer not to wear makeup or do their hair, that doesn’t make them any less of a woman. You can look however you want to look — within regulation — and be your own brand of woman.”
Riley Ceder is a reporter at Military Times, where he covers breaking news, criminal justice, investigations, and cyber. He previously worked as an investigative practicum student at The Washington Post, where he contributed to the Abused by the Badge investigation.
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