Eric Schmidt:
CLASS OF 1979
Avon High SchoolClass of 1979
Avon, IN
Ohio State University - Electrical EngineeringClass of 1986
Columbus, OH
Eric's Story
Here¿s a short biography of my life since high school. After graduation I headed off to the Air Force as a basic trainee in Lackland Air Force Base, Texas. My first assignment was back to Indiana ¿ Grissom Air Force Base. I learned all about life in Strategic Air Command (yup, just like in the movies.) I got married while I was there and shortly we headed off to Hellenikon Air Base, Greece. Sounds wonderful I know but sometimes living somewhere is not at all the same as visiting as a tourist. I took college classes there and earned enough credit to apply for and receive a scholarship from the Air Force to finish my bachelors in Electrical Engineering. We went to The Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio for that. (Probably the hardest job I ever held.) Also, our first boy, Matthew, was born in Columbus just 6 weeks before I graduated.
After college graduation I went back to Texas for Officer Training School and graduated a Second Lieutenant. Nope, didn¿t learn the first time ¿ went back to Texas in the summer. We headed off to Washington DC for the next assignment and ended up traveling between DC and Mississippi for three years on different assignments before we finally settled in Biloxi Mississippi for another three year assignment. (By the way, all of these are three year assignments.)
I was an electrical engineer up until the end of my tour in Mississippi when I was finally assigned to the unit I¿d been trying to join for 10 years ¿ Air Force Office of Special Investigations. AFOSI is the agency that conducts all major criminal and counterintelligence investigations for the Air Force. I became a computer crime investigator and headed off, first to training to learn how to be a special agent, and then to Florida for yet another three year tour. I was on...Expand for more
e of two agents supporting all the criminal and counterintelligence investigations for the Southeast US, Central, and South America. The AFOSI Computer Crime Investigations group was the first such group in all of US government.
I traveled quite a bit then, all over the US and Central America. After three years we got to go to Germany for another three year assignment. (I was a Captain by now.) In Germany I headed up the Computer Crime unit and, most of the time, provided more counterintelligence support than criminal investigations. I traveled all over Europe, from Norway to Turkey anyway. I got to experience some really unique things. I once taught a computer crime course in Budapest, Hungary to Hungarian Law Enforcement and Counterintelligence agents completely through an interpreter ¿ really a lot of fun. (The wall had come down and we were all friends then.)
After Germany I went back to DC and headquarters. I ended up in charge of Computer Crime for AFOSI before I retired as a Major in 2000. (Headquarters is a whole different and interesting kind of fun.) Once I retired we came back to Indiana. I settled into a new job with Ernst & Young as a security consultant, built a house, and we had our second boy, William. I lasted as a consultant exactly three years ¿ I¿m into a greater mission than the mission of making money for one thing. Luckily the Chief Security Officer job at the IU School of Medicine came open I 2003 and I¿ve been there ever since.
Since retirement, I¿ve become a duathlete, an ultra-marathon runner, and a published poet on top of all the other jobs of father, son, husband, and taker-out-of-trash. I think the extreme athletic events help make up for the lack of excitement AFOSI gave me. I¿m still trying to figure that (and me)out though.
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