About PEC

Training our full time staff was the first issue I wanted to address when I became Chief of the National Guard Bureau, the result was the Professional Education Center.

The Lavern E. Weber Professional Education Center, located at Camp Robinson in North Little Rock, Arkansas, is the national training center for the Army National Guard. The Professional Education Center (PEC) has been a full service training and conferencing facility since 1974. Over the past quarter of a century, PEC has undergone changes to its leadership, staff, facilities, training methodologies, and conference support. Its mission is committed in providing “excellence in education to the total force.” At the heart of the Professional Education Center are the 6 Training Battalions.

Camp Robinson is home to the PEC and its 75-acre campus consisting of 25 buildings and a total staff of approximately 420 military, civilian contractor personnel. We annually provide instruction to over 20,000 members of the military force.

The Professional Education Center also hosts over 5,000 conferees annually from the National Guard, Army Reserve, Active Army, DOD, State and Federal agencies. These conferences typically provide 3 to 5 day training sessions covering specific subjects and discussions on a wide variety of issues such as: mobilizations and deployments; standards; new tactics, techniques, and procedures; and leadership development. The Army National Guard Senior Commanders' Conference, FORSCOM Command Readiness Program Conference, Winston P. Wilson Marksmanship Competition, Training and Requirements Opportunities Sourcing Conference, Army National Guard Fixed Wing Conference, and the Army National Guard Chief of Staff Advisory Council Conference are just a few of the conferences held at PEC.

The PEC Culture

Building Readiness for Known and Unknown Challenges

The Professional Education Center (PEC) is the premier organization within the National Guard, providing an unparalleled experience for current and future leaders. The PEC is focused on building adaptive and innovative leaders who are well trained on systems and processes and are able to leverage those systems to build readiness across the force. PEC provides unique educational opportunities that only exist here. Our programs ensure that the National Guard is prepared to operate in an ambiguous environment against emerging and constantly evolving threats. PEC is the Center of Innovation across the National Guard, seizing opportunities to develop leaders, systems, and processes to ensure that our force is Always Ready!

Vision & Mission

Tomorrow Starts Today

The Professional Education Center builds agile, adaptive leaders across the National Guard who are trained and ready to meet challenges in a dynamic operational environment, prepared to serve our communities and our Nation. PEC provides a foundational readiness for our force by training current and future leaders to employ and leverage existing and emerging systems, technologies, tactics, and processes to build readiness throughout their formations.

The PEC of 2030 stands as the premier training institution across the Department of Defense. PEC is committed to providing an unrivaled experience to leaders of all ranks through the employment of the most modern education and training methods and technologies by the best instructors in the world. We remain focused on the Soldier as the most valuable and precious resource in the Army, ensuring that everything we do contributes to building readiness so that those Soldiers can deploy, fight, and win in any environment, against any adversary, at any time.

PEC Approach

Prepare – Educate – Challenge

PEC is focused on the Citizen-Soldier and the importance of providing a ready force for our communities and the Nation. Our proactive approach results in measurable increases to readiness at the individual and organizational levels. Aggressively addressing threats to readiness results in every student returning to their unit better trained and ready to positively impact their organization. Each leader who passes through our doors will have access to the most innovative, best qualified, and well trained instructors in the Army. Each element of our approach – Prepare, Educate, and Challenge – will contribute to the readiness of our force.

Prepare Leaders

“Comfortable Being Uncomfortable”

Recognizing that the greatest threats we face in the future remain unknown, the PEC is educating leaders who are able to work in ambiguous and rapidly changing environments. Soldiers will face competition & conflict that will occur across multiple domains, against multiple competitors. Leaders across the force will face unprecedented problems that require repurposing existing / limited resources in a time constrained environment. This demands that leaders are educated on how to think instead of what to think. The PEC develops adaptive leaders who are nimble and understand how to solve problems before they occur. Our graduates are trained and prepared to see opportunities where others see obstacles.

Educate the Force

Preparing to Prevail

PEC is educating Soldiers how to think critically, be proactive, life-long learners and who understand the principles of Mission Command. Soldiers are learning to recognize when conditions begin to change and are empowered to take action within the commander’s intent. We challenge them to tackle the toughest problems and develop solutions using teamwork that leverages the diversity of our force, melding the valuable personal experiences of our Citizen-Soldiers to create an unmatched advantage. The PEC is a resource multiplier, enabling leaders at all levels to maximize resources to build the readiness required to accomplish every mission.

Challenge Paradigms

Winning in the Future

The ability to leverage existing and emerging technologies in new and innovative ways has provided a critical advantage throughout the history of competition. The PEC is developing leaders who do not wait for adverse events to seek opportunities to challenge the status quo. Winning requires leaders who build readiness for tomorrow’s challenges and who constantly question their own assumptions about what is possible. The PEC is educating for tomorrow, to ensure that we are ready for the next challenge/opportunity, not the last.

PEC Priorities

People

People are our most valuable and most limited resource. They are also our greatest strength and advantage over our adversaries. We treat each other with respect and dignity while also challenging each other to bring about our absolute best. While we look to our future, PEC embraces our history and those who have come before us. This history is rich with ingenious leaders who were willing to seek a better path forward. We will leverage those lessons learned throughout our history to understand how we have arrived where we are, so we are better able to navigate into the future.

Excellence

In every task that we undertake, we will work as a team to deliver outstanding results. We will retain our position as the preeminent organization by demonstrating excellence in everything we do. Recognizing our role in building readiness for the 335,000 men and women of the Army National Guard, quality must be woven into the very fabric of the PEC experience. In combat there is no reward for second place, and it is the reason we embrace the responsibility of providing a world class education for those who will lead our Nation’s sons and daughters into harm’s way. It is a sacred trust that is placed in us to build readiness to allow our Soldiers to go anywhere in the world, fight, and win against any adversary.

Communication

Every Soldier in the Army National Guard today that has been directly impacted by a graduate of PEC. Our role gives us a unique insight into the force, while our ability to synthesize the feedback from the user level in the field and communicate that across the organization to all stakeholders is unmatched. Externally and internally, we ensure consistent messaging and are recognized for our ability to connect solutions to emerging challenges. This ability to communicate across every level provides our most senior leaders the information to make critical decisions.

Modernization

As the nature of competition and conflict changes, the PEC sees this opportunity to reform our processes, systems, and methods of education to build an organization that is ready for tomorrow, today. We are aggressively moving with purpose and direction in our mission. Leaders leave PEC better prepared to build readiness and increase the competitive advantage of the National Guard. We are seizing opportunities in technology, education, and the integration of each to provide the best learning experience possible. PEC is leading from the front on methods to improve education within the National Guard and we will analyze, design, and develop solutions required to meet the needs of the operational force in the field.

Why PEC Matters

19 years after 9/11, the world remains a dangerous place. As a dual missioned force, the National Guard faces a complex environment that continues to change. Economic pressures, natural and environmental issues, increasing competition across multiple domains, instant access to technology and information, and the rise of peer competition across the globe form the operational environment that the National Guard finds itself in today. This demands that our Soldiers change and adapt to face the threats not only of today, but those of tomorrow as well. Whether those challenges are acts of nature or man, our communities and our Nation expects us to overcome those obstacles and ensure that our way of life is secure. The PEC provides the education and training required to build and maintain the readiness our force requires. The PEC will always deliver on our promise that “Building Readiness”

Army Values...

Loyalty, Duty, Respect, Selfless Service, Honor, Integrity, Personal Courage