The application window for the second round of the Career Intermission Program will close Aug. 31, and the panel that will choose up to 20 officers and 20 enlisted airmen will convene Sept. 29. Selected airmen will begin their sabbaticals in 2016.

The Air Force on March 2 announced that 32 airmen — 14 officers and 18 enlisted — had been selected to take part in the first round of CIP, and to take between one year to three years off. Of those, about 70 percent temporarily left the Air Force.

One of those airmen, C-21 pilot Capt. Shannon Williams, gave birth to her first daughter in February, and is planning to use her three years off to raise her. She hopes to have a second child, and because the CIP program will make it easier to start a family, Williams said she plans to stay in the Air Force for a full 20-year career.

The Air Force first announced the CIP program last year, which is also being used by the Army, Navy and Marine Corps. In a March speech on diversity, Air Force Secretary Deborah Lee James lauded the program and said she wanted to expand it beyond the current 40-airman maximum. Defense Secretary Ash Carter also said that month that such programs should be improved and expanded.

The Pentagon asked Congress to strike the current 40-service member limit on the program for all services in a proposed amendment to the fiscal 2016 National Defense Authorization Act.

Under the program, airmen enter the Individual Ready Reserve and continue to receive their usual medical and dental coverage, as well as exchange and commissary benefits. They also receive a stipend of one-fifteenth of their usual monthly basic pay. The Air Force will pay to move an airman from his or her duty station to any location in the U.S., and then move the airman to his or her follow-on base at the end of the program. The airmen are required to check in with the CIP's program manager once a month. They are required to maintain their health, fitness and other standards while on a break, and to be ready to fully resume their duties.

When the CIP airmen return to the Air Force, they will have to spend twice as long in active-duty status as they spent in CIP, meaning someone who takes three years off would have to serve at least six years after coming back to the Air Force.

Stephen Losey is the air warfare reporter for Defense News. He previously covered leadership and personnel issues at Air Force Times, and the Pentagon, special operations and air warfare at Military.com. He has traveled to the Middle East to cover U.S. Air Force operations.

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