WRIGHT-PATTERSON AIR FORCE BASE, Ohio (AFLCMC)---The 2026 Simulation & Training Community Forum brought together government, industry, and academic stakeholders at the Convention Center in Dayton, Ohio, April 22, to discuss the future of training and simulation across the defense enterprise.
Hosted by the National Training & Simulation Association (NTSA) with support from the Air Force Life Cycle Management Center’s (AFLCMC) Training Directorate, the one‑day forum emphasized collaboration, giving participants a focused venue to share priorities, explore emerging technologies, and identify practical ways to strengthen readiness.
The event blended structured sessions with ample networking opportunities. Plenary presentations and panels outlined current challenges, modernization efforts, and evolving training requirements. Attendees included acquisition officials, operational users, researchers, and corporate leaders from large integrators to niche technology providers.
The agenda highlighted several recurring themes: accelerating the delivery of advanced training capabilities, integrating live, virtual, and constructive environments, and improving interoperability and scalability through common standards and architectures.
“Everything we do extends from the Air Force’s purpose to fly, fix, fight, and ultimately win,” said Col. Elwood Waddell, AFLCMC Training Directorate’s deputy director, during the forum’s opening session. “It’s a very pithy, very succinct summary of why we are here. We only do this warfighting function we call acquisition because ultimately, we have to support a fight.”
Waddell highlighted a growing cultural shift across the entire department, which is enabling faster acquisitions, putting the Air Force on a wartime footing while focusing on the warfighter.
Throughout the day, the importance of incorporating simulation early in the lifecycle of new systems was repeatedly stressed, ensuring robust training solutions are available as platforms and capabilities enter service.
Panels featuring representatives from multiple operational and support organizations offered a field‑driven view of training needs. They discussed topics such as distributed mission training, high‑fidelity simulation for complex missions, and the role of data, analytics, and digital engineering in designing more effective training systems.
Throughout, participants underscored that technical innovation must be aligned with real‑world training outcomes and constraints.
“One of the lines of effort we have been challenged to tackle is in casting a vision for the training enterprise and then road mapping program activities in order to achieve that vision in partnership with industry and our MAJCOM [major command] customers,” said Jacob Miracle, the technical director for the Training Directorate’s newly stood up Training Integration Office. “We also have a dedicated team looking at the opportunities that emerging technologies are presenting to us, especially disruptive technologies such as artificial intelligence, and not only how we apply them to our business processes and gain efficiencies in our day-to-day business, but also how we apply them to our operational systems in a way that is meaningful to those who train.”
The forum also provided a platform for industry and other solution providers to showcase their capabilities. Short spotlight segments allowed organizations to briefly present their offerings and highlight how they address priority training challenges.
Overall, the 2026 Simulation & Training Community Forum served as a catalyst for ongoing collaboration in the training and simulation community. By bringing together diverse stakeholders around shared readiness objectives, the event helped align technology development, operational requirements, and acquisition strategies to better prepare warfighters for increasingly complex mission environments.