Staff Sgt. Victoria Ortiz and her group of future soldiers gather together at her recruiting office to conduct physical fitness training. (U.S. Army)
Army Staff Sgt. Victoria Ortiz is new to recruiting but makes sure she is authentic with people.
“People think that you have to lose yourself because you’re in a uniform and you don’t. People pick up on what’s real and what’s not,” said Ortiz, who is stationed at the Jacksonville Recruiting Station, N.C. “Every contract is personal. It’s not a numbers game. It’s about helping those individuals.”
Ortiz is one of 30 Army recruiters being recognized by the service during a ceremony Thursday at Conmy Hall at Joint Base Myer-Henderson Hall in Arlington, Va.
She signed 82 recruits last year.
The Army’s goal for fiscal 2026, which began Oct. 1, is to recruit 60,000 soldiers. Last year it aimed for 61,000 new soldiers and signed on 62,050.
“We asked every recruiter to put in 11 each. In the room here, and the rest of the 30, hit somewhere in the 40s to the 80s … four to eight times what we expected of them,” Command Sgt. Maj. Danny Basham, the senior noncommissioned officer in the Army Recruiting Division at Fort Knox, Ky., said Wednesday.
Over the past several years, the Pentagon and the military services have made changes to who is eligible to enlist — mostly to open access to a shrinking pool of eligible candidates and to alleviate a gap in some services meeting recruiting goals after the coronavirus pandemic.
The Army missed its goal in 2022 and 2023 but has since rebounded, in part due to the measures it took to overhaul how it recruits.
Among those changes, the Army created a prep course to help those meet the fitness goals and test scores required of new recruits, and the Defense Department adjusted the medical conditions that are allowed for enlistees.
The Army has also expanded to allow warrant and noncommissioned officers for new recruiting jobs.
Several recruiters being recognized said social media is a tool for them to share information and benefits about the Army, as well as answer questions potential recruits may have.
Ortiz said she uses social media through a group she created called “recruiting with friends.”
“Sometimes I might not have the answer, or maybe my battle buddy to my left and right at the recruiting station might not be as experienced in certain areas and avenues. So I reach out to other recruiters who specialize with social media to get feedback,” she said.
During the recruiters visit to the Pentagon on Wednesday, Ortiz posted on Instagram about getting to finally meet two staff sergeants she has been working with.
Sgt. 1st Class Brenda Kunde, who is stationed at the Largo Recruiting Station, Md., said social media was a big platform for her when she first started. The initial advice she received was not to look at comments right away because it will filter and then you’ll get feedback.
Her advice to recruiters using social media is to post about their lives and activities.
“The conception out there is that soldiers, you don’t have a life when you join the Army,” said Kunde, who signed 46 recruits. “So when you post … it gives the applicant a different perspective about the Army, and they want to know more. They contact you and those that do not even have the intention to join now they change their minds to join.”
Some goals for the Army in 2026 include being able to meet senior Army leaders’ vision for the future force and completing the rollout of the the Accessions Information Environment, or AIE, said Brig. Gen. Sara Dudley, commander of Army Recruiting Division.
“It is the enlistment backbone to do and manage all of the initial entry records of somebody from the first contact with the Army, and then that will flow through to their end of their career,” Dudley said. “That system is being tested at the Indianapolis [Recruiting] Battalion right now, and it is going to be rolled out to the rest of the division this year.”
