Chief of Staff
Colonel Jeffrey H. Curtis '79 U.S. Air Force (Retired)
Colonel Jeff Curtis, ’79 assumed the duties of Chief of Staff on 1 July 2009.
He retired from the U.S. Air Force in 2006 as a colonel with over 24 years of service. He served in numerous postings world-wide as a judge advocate.
As Chief of Staff, Curtis is responsible for coordinating the actions of the Institute’s primary staff officers and ensuring integration of all organizational and Post operations, events, and issues. His additional duties include publishing and maintaining all general orders, special orders, and memoranda, and coordination with the offices of the Registrar and the Commandant of Cadets for official cadet files. He serves as chair of the Institute Planning Committee, composed of senior VMI executives who issue policy guidance and provide advice to the Superintendent. Curtis also chairs the Institute’s Equity Committee.
During his Air Force career, Colonel Curtis served in a variety of positions in the continental United States, Republic of Korea, and Southwest Asia. Following several years of criminal litigation at the trial and appellate levels, he served in various staff and programming jobs. In 1992, he began his first of eight consecutive assignments as a staff judge advocate, advising senior commanders on all legal issues affecting the command. He served at the wing, numbered air force, joint task force, and unified command levels as the chief legal advisor to senior Air Force, Army, and Navy commanders. In 2001, he was the staff judge advocate for Joint Task Force-Southwest Asia and served as principal advisor to the Deputy Combined Air Forces Air Component Commander during Operation Enduring Freedom. During that period he advised on operational law and rules of engagement. He later served as the staff judge advocate for United States Strategic command and Headquarters, 18th Air Force prior to his retirement.
Curtis earned a Bachelor of Arts degree, with distinction, in Economics from VMI, where he was an Air Force ROTC scholarship recipient. Following his cadetship, he entered the Air Force’s Educational Delay Program to attend law school at the T.C. Williams School of Law, University of Richmond. He later obtained a Master of Arts degree in Business Administration from Webster University and a Master of Laws degree in procurement law from the National Law Center, George Washington University. He is a graduate of the Air Force’s Squadron Officers School, Air Command and Staff College, and Air War College.
Colonel Curtis’ wife, Betsy, is originally from St. Petersburg, Florida. She is a lieutenant colonel in the Air National Guard, where she serves as an instructor pilot with the 170th Wing at Offutt Air Force Base, Nebraska.