United States Naval Academy Top Questions

The best advice that I could give to myself as a high school senior is to make decisions based on what I personally value and what makes me happiest. There are so many outside pressures that come into play when picking a college and then on to pick a major and so on and so forth. It is always important to keep in mind what I personally want, not what others want for me. If you make decisions to make someone else happy you will be unhappy yourself and then become stuff between a rock and hard place. These decisions will form the rest of your life past what you are living now. They will form who you become friends with, what kind of job you'll have and everything else that comes along with living in the real world. Your values are the most important when making decisions that will impact your entire life.

These will definitely be the happiest four years of your life. Unfortunately, these will also be some of the hardest, most arduous, years of your life too. In college you will feel on top of the world and utterly defeated (sometimes in the same day). Remember that you’re not doing anything wrong if you’re having a hard time. And before you jump to any conclusions about how much happier everyone else is, and how much more fun they’re having than you, go sit down and talk to a friend. You’d be surprised by how many people feel lost and directionless at least some point in their college careers.

College is not easy. For the first time students are thrust from their home into a world where every meal is not made for them, their laundry is not magically clean every morning, and their friends and family are not there to help them with difficult situations. My greatest discovery at college was how you never really know how much you enjoy something until it is not there to enjoy. With that knowledge, I would tell myself as a high school senior to not take for granted anything that I had. I would tell myself to squeeze tighter and hold on longer during every hug; to laugh a little harder and a little louder with my friends; to roll on the floor with my dogs and give them an extra belly-rub; to slow-down and cherish the home cooked meals; to thank my parents and listen to them more; and to spend an extra hour under the stars talking about nothing with my girlfriend. College is new, exciting, and different. But there are no dogs to rub against you after school, no home-cooked meals to engorge yourself with, and no mom or dad to say I love you.

I've waited over ten years to attend this college. Sometime life can get in the way of your goals. With hard work, determination and patience, I am finally attending the school of my dreams. You just have to have a passion for what you believe in and never give up!

Beyond a fantastic education, the Naval Academy has assisted me in becoming a well rounded individual. I am not only involved in academics but the Naval Academy has given me the oppertunity to start the first academy women's golf team. While my experience at the Academy taught me disipline, respect for authority and an understanding of the improtance of team work, I was forced to leave the academy after my sophmore year. This is due to an injury that I sustained during physical training at the Academy. While at my new institution, my experiences at the Naval Academy have transformed me into a strong student that is able quickly addapt. Since transfering, I have been at the College of William and Mary for one semester and I am a leader in three extracuricular activities and I have a GPA of 3.8. The greatest advantage that the academy gave me was the confidence and the skill set to succede regardless of my surroundings.

I have gained knowledge in just my first semester in college that I had never attained before in my life, and that is in the departments of photojournalism and astro-physics. Even after being a photographer years prior to my first semester, I have already learned information and technique that has shed a whole new light on what I do for a living. It showed me that photography isn't just a beautiful picture, it's a beautiful moment accompanied by an amazing story that may have never been told before. Astro-physics, on the other hand, completely blew my mind. I gained an unbelievable amount of insight about our universe, and it put such a raw interest in my heart for science that had never been there before. Ever since, i have been truly obsessed with the cosmos and astronomy science and I can really say that it has had one of the most mentally and educationally inspiring influences on my life today.

With all honesty, the beginning of my college career has been a very rocky and very unsure road. Coming into the "new world," I was truly unaware of the responsibilites attached to this pursuit of higher education. I was unfamiliar of the life, the responsibilites, and lastly, I was unfamiliar with my true self and what I wanted to pursue in life. Throughout my journey, though with a rough start and many changes in what I wanted to focus on, I finally found my true life's motive. My college experience allowed me to explore an unfamilar atmosphere, interect with others and ultimately discover myself. If the college experience does anything, it's allows students to find who they are, no matter how long it takes and what obsticles they faced to get a hold of their place in life. It also matures undergraduates as they face the real life responsibilties that are placed upon their shoulders. Attending college opened my eyes, guided me, broke me down then made me stronger. This is why I value my college career and I'm proud to say that I am currently a Computer Information Systems major with many goals ahead.

From my college experience, I have learned that you can't always do what you want to do. Being in college is a whole new world and in order to succeed, you have to put aside some personal things and do the school work and learn to manage your time wisely. Life will be like that in the business world and learning to do it in college will make tings easier to do once you have your degree. Lessons learned here, such as time management and deciding between what you want to do and what you need to do are some things of great value I've gained since being a college student at The United States Naval Academy.

i have received a lot from the little college that I have already had. The classes are great and the teachers are better. The teachers here actually care about how you do in your classes and want you to go on to do great things in our lives. I really enjoy the campus life here on the campus. There are so many people here and all of them of different backgrounds. It really has been a great experience so far to be attending college. It is so different from high school, but at the same time, i feel the comfort of being in a safe environment. I love the college I am attending at the time and I am happy that I made the choice to come to college. Without college, I would be struggling with bills and all kinds of different problems. However, I am working hard here at Victoria College to get a better education to get a better future.

During my two and a half years here, I have learned that the academic aspect of school is only part of the experience. Having different leadership postitions has afforded me the opportunity to develop myself mentally and emotionally for my future in the military world. I have learned a great deal about how to relate to people on a more personal level in order to motivate them at their jobs. I have also learned that rules, although purposeful, have situations where they can and must be broken in order to do the "right" thing. When put in a situation where I must chose between breaking the rules while helping someone and obeying the rules and ignoring someone else's misfortune, I know for a fact that I will do whatever I can to help that person, even if it means getting myself in trouble. Selflessness is the ingredient that our society today lacks. If this virtue is reinstated as an important value once more, society would begin to make the changes that are necessary to solve communal, national, and even as far reaching as international issues. The opportunity to cultivate this virtue in myself is what college has given me.