USMEPCOM Proceeds with Transformation Initiatives

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Jan 23 2019
By Louis B. Wiseman

NORTH CHICAGO, Ill. -- United States Military Entrance Processing Command is moving ahead in taking All-Volunteer Force from packetless to paperless to all digital enlistment processing.

The command has already digitized some of its operations saving millions of printed pages per years. A large portion of the reduction has been accomplished by digitizing Department of Defense Form 4, Enlistment/Reenlistment Document – Armed Forces of the United States and DD Form 93, Record of Emergency Data. These documents are now transmitted electronically to the services' basic training sites.

Perhaps the best example of the command's efforts to move into the digital realm is the packetless shipping in coordination with the Air Force and the Navy. Recruits now carry a standard business envelope with only three items – a meal voucher, one copy of their orders with travel instructions printed on the reverse side and their travel itinerary. The envelope can be easily placed in a pocket or purse, unlike the large manila envelopes called "shipper packets" carried by generations of young men and women bound for boot camp.

The command is moving forward with even bigger plans. The new data platform for processing applicants – USMIRS 1.1 – is currently being tested at the Milwaukee Military Entrance Processing soon. After thorough testing, the cloud-based platform will be rolled out nationwide. It will replace individual file servers at each of the 65 MEPS and the headquarters. Being cloud-based means USMIRS 1.1 isn't constrained by the capacity of physical servers. The system can be dynamically adjusted up or down depending on workload meaning the system's capacity operates efficiently at all times.

Medical processing is modernizing, too.

The Joint Legacy Viewer will give MEPS medical personnel access to read-only health history information. The pilot program will expand to eight MEPS in February 2019.

Even bigger changes – Military Health System GENESIS – will allow the MEPS to initiate the electronic health record for every new member of the armed forces. The record will follow them throughout their military careers and into Veterans Affairs after their service is complete.

USMEPCOM plans to continue transforming to the all-digital realm. Anticipation of and response to change has been USMEPCOM's focus from its earliest days. Just as typewriters gave way to word processors which gave way to personal computers, the current methods of processing are moving aside to allow new technology and capabilities to replace them.