Texas Business Business
By Austen McClain, Naval Education and Training Command | US DOW
Marine Corps Sgt. Kade Prentice walked into a Portland, Oregon, recruiting office looking for a fresh start. Six years later, he stands at the head of a classroom at Naval Air Station North Island, California, in the same schoolhouse where he trained as a young Marine. Today, he teaches the next generation of technicians who keep Navy and Marine Corps aviation in the fight.
Prentice is an instructor and course supervisor at the Center for Naval Aviation Technical Training Unit North Island, a subordinate unit of the Center for Naval Aviation Technical Training and a learning center of Naval Education and Training Command.
In fiscal year 2025, he was named the CNATT domain’s Junior Instructor of the Year. The award caps a career that began in NETC’s training pipeline, took him from a Marine aviation logistics squadron to a deployment with the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit and brought him back to the schoolhouse where his own technical training began.
Prentice grew up in Happy Valley, Oregon, and graduated from Clackamas High School. He started college, but the math on a four-year degree did not add up.
“I realized what continuing my education would cost, and I had always wanted to serve,” he said. “I figured this was a good time to join the military and keep working on my education while I was in.”
His path to the recruiting office took longer than most, but the calculus was simple.
“It was either take out the loans to finish my four-year degree or find a way to start my life,” Prentice said. “Looking back on it, it felt like a no-brainer.”
In December 2019, he reported to Marine Corps Recruit Depot San Diego. After boot camp came Marine combat training at Camp Pendleton, California; the Aviation Support Equipment “A” school at Naval Air Station Pensacola, Florida; and the “C” school at CNATTU North Island, the same courses he now teaches. In February 2021, with the NETC pipeline behind him, he checked in to Marine Aviation Logistics Squadron 26 at Marine Corps Air Station New River, North Carolina, where he advanced to work center supervisor and earned qualifications as a production controller and full-systems collateral duty inspector.
Tested at Sea
In December 2022, Prentice joined the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit and deployed aboard the amphibious assault ship USS Bataan and the amphibious transport dock USS Mesa Verde. He served first as a work center supervisor aboard the Bataan before taking over as the support equipment noncommissioned officer in charge aboard the amphibious assault ship USS Mesa Verde. The Marine Corps promoted him to sergeant in January 20
Prentice credited the technical foundation he built in NETC schoolhouses with preparing him for the demands of deployment. His operational experience later inspired him to return to the classroom as an instructor.
“Serving in these high-tempo operational environments highlighted the critical need for expertly trained Marines, which ultimately inspired my transition from the fleet to the classroom in August 2024,” Prentice said.
That August, Prentice received orders to CNATTU North Island, the same schoolhouse he briefly attended as a student four years earlier. Within months, he was selected as a course supervisor, and by the end of the fiscal year, he had earned Junior Instructor of the Quarter and, ultimately, fiscal year 2025 Junior Instructor of the Year for the CNATT domain.
The hardest part of being a Marine, he said, was never the technical material.
“I was an awkward kid growing up. It was hard to stand in front of people and tell them what needed to be done,” Prentice said. “I was not a leader before I joined, but I have grown into the role exponentially.”
