Military Report

Army Staff Sgt. Craig A. Flanagan has returned to Fort Richardson, Anchorage, Alaska, after being deployed to Afghanistan for one year.

He is the son of Judy Crilley of Apollo Drive, Carson City and a 2004 graduate of North Valleys High School, Reno.

Flanagan is one of 3,500 members of the 4th Airborne Brigade Combat Team (Airborne), 25th Infantry Division stationed at Fort Richardson. Airborne combat team members included soldiers assigned to one of six battalions and regiments of the 25th Infantry Division.

The airborne brigade served in three eastern provinces of Afghanistan, which included the Paktya, Paktika and Khost. Some of the challenges the brigade soldiers faced included poverty, unemployment, security, and management of natural resources and government institutions. Soldiers improved roads, provided vocational training in construction and civics, improved and re-opened 29 schools, remodeled six medical clinics and improved three district courthouses.

While deployed in Afghanistan, he was decorated with the Bronze Star Medal with valor and the Meritorious Service Medal.

Flanagan, a squad leader, is normally assigned to the 1st Battalion, 501st Parachute Infantry Regiment. He has served in the military for six years.

Midshipman 2nd class (junior) Andrew J. Stephenson of Carson City, has been selected by the Naval Academy as a Trident Scholar for the 2010-2011 academic year.

The Trident Scholar program, begun in 1963, provides exceptionally capable midshipmen in high academic standing the opportunity to engage in independent study and research during their senior year.

A class of 2007 graduate of Carson High School, Stephenson was president of the National Honor Society. He received a congressional appointment to the Naval Academy where he is now an information technology major.

Stephenson's Trident Scholar project is entitled "Robust and Lightweight Network Layer Security in Wireless Ad-Hoc Sensor Networks." He will be aided in his research by visiting Professor Eric J. Harder and Assistant Professor Patrick J. Vincent, both of the Naval Academy computer science department.

According to Stephenson's proposal, his project seeks "to investigate adaptive routing schemes for foiling cyber attacks on small, resource and power constrained wireless networks."

Each year, midshipmen in the top 10 percent of their class at the end of the fall semester of their junior year are invited to submit research project proposals and programs of study for evaluation. Trident Scholars have modified academic programs for their first class (senior) year, substituting research courses and theses for traditional courses within their major.

Midshipmen chosen for the Trident Scholar program for the next academic year are named each spring.

"The exceptional quality of this and other Naval Academy student research programs can be directly attributed to the sustained and consistent support provided to the Naval Academy by the Office of Naval Research (ONR)," said Dr. Carl Wick, associate director for midshipmen research at the academy.

In April 2011, each scholar's project accomplishments will be assessed by the Trident Scholar Committee through an evaluation of his/her final written report and poster presentation. The Trident prize will be awarded to the scholar producing the most outstanding Trident project for the 2011 graduating class.

For more information on the Trident Scholar program, go to www.usna.edu/TridentProgram.

For more information about the Naval Academy, go to www.usna.edu.