Hero combat medic "unqualified to be an emergency medical technician"

Ex-soldier is a hero abroad, but unemployed at home

By Drew Brooks
Staff writer

In Afghanistan, Nick Colgin was a hero.

In America, he's unemployed.

Colgin, who earned a Bronze Star as a member of Fort Bragg's 82nd Airborne Division, has become one of the faces of the unemployed veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

His efforts in finding employment became part of history when President Obama referred to him during a speech in August that focused on the need to better prepare veterans for the workforce.

When he was with the Army, then Spc. Colgin was recognized for saving the life of a French soldier who had been shot in the head and for working with other soldiers to rescue more than 40 civilians from a flood. Colgin assumed that a stellar military career would transfer to his civilian life when he left Fort Bragg and the Army in June 2008.

But reality was much crueler for Colgin once the Army rank was dropped from his last name.

A combat medic as a soldier, Colgin found himself unqualified to be an emergency medical technician in Wyoming, where he had hoped to start a new, adventurous life.
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