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The Air Force Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps staff includes 21 headquarters personnel and more than 1,919 retired Air Force officer and enlisted military instructors. There are about 890 Air force Junior ROTC units with more than 120,000 cadets in high school across the United states and select Department of Defense Dependent Schools in Europe and the Pacific as well as public schools in Puerto Rico and Guam. The Air Force plans to continue expansion efforts to 995 units by 2020 when funds are available. With the addition of new units. AFJROTC is expected to reach more than 135,000 cadets worldwide.

Air Force Junior Officer Training Corps (JROTC) can track its heritage to a program founded in 1911 in Cheyenne, Wyoming, by Army Lt Edgar R. Steevers. The Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps came into being with the passage of the National Defense Act of 1916, which authorized a junior course for non-college military schools, high schools and other non-preparatory schools. In 1864, the ROTC Vitalization Act expanded JROTC programs to the other services; Navy, Marines, and Air Force. As a result, active duty Army instructors were replaced with military retirees.

Eight years later, in 1972, females were allowed in JROTC programs as cadets, but were not accounted for until 1973. By May 1981, over 32,000 women were enrolled in the high school units.

JROTC taught combat tactics and weapons training, and military based tactics such as first aid. In 1990 everything took a change as a result to a curriculum change. The curriculum dropped combat tactics and weapons training, and increased the focus on citizenship. As a result the mission statement of JROTC was modified from "Motivating young people to be good Americans", to "To motivated young people to be better citizens." Today the mission and goals are to develop citizens to instill values of citizenship, give service to the United States, develop a person responsibility, and instill a sense of accomplishment in high school students.

The AFJROTC program positively influences our country by helping one student at a time. Comprised solely of active duty Air Force retirees, the AFJROTC is helping to form tomorrow's nation by educating proud and patriotic cadets to become tomorrow's leaders.