Tuskegee University alumna Lt. Kayla Freeman became the first black woman in Alabama history to join the state’s national guard as a pilot.
The 2016 TU graduate who serves as an aerospace engineer at Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Alabama completed training at Fort Rucker Army Aviation school last month, and was pinned by retired Col. Christine “Nickey” Knighton, the first woman in the U.S. Army to command a tactical combat arms battalion.
“I didn’t think about making history when I started this journey. I just wanted to do the best that I could do and hopefully inspire a few people along the way,” she said.
According to Tuskegee officials, she will deploy to deploy next month to the Middle East as a platoon leader in the Alabama National Guard’s 1-169th Aviation Battalion.
