Col Michael W. Povilus is the Director of Strategic Plans, Requirements and Future Conflict at Headquarters, U.S. Air Force Academy. He also serves as the Director of the Academy’s Institute for Future Conflict. Previously, he was Dean of Students and Professor of Strategy & Security Studies at the School of Advanced Air and Space Studies (SAASS), Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama.

Prior to assuming his faculty position at SAASS, Col Povilus commanded the Air Force Reserve Officer Training Corps Detachment 195 at the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago, Illinois. He also served as the Chief of the Arms Control Implementation Unit for the Defense Threat Reduction Agency at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow, Russia.

Col Povilus graduated from the University of Florida in 1996 and received his commission from Officer Training School in 2003. He has completed multiple tours as both an air battle manager and a foreign area officer. He deployed in support of Operation Enduring Freedom while assigned to the 7th Expeditionary Airborne Command and Control Squadron. Col Povilus also became the Air Force’s first-ever Social-Cultural Affairs Branch Chief while deployed to the Theater Security Cooperation Division in Kyrgyzstan.