Application Advice
If I were to give high school applicants advice when applying to the Academy, I would tell them to continue to be highly involved in their high school activities and schoolwork. The Academy is an extremely busy place and everyone has clubs and sports they are involved with, in addition to military and academic obligations. […]
Time Management
Being a cadet, student, and a collegiate athlete can be difficult to balance at times. In order to balance all of these, it requires intense planning, dedication, and persistence. Careful planning is necessary to meet all the deadlines required by the Academy. I always keep a detailed planner and write down every deadline I must […]
How to be Successful at the Coast Guard Academy
Because of how much structure there is in your schedule at the Coast Guard Academy, life for me at the Academy is just like high school…on steroids! Since you are a full-time college student, while also being a full-time member of the military, also most likely an athlete or musician of some sort, also someone […]
Post-Swab Summer Transition
As I made the transition from Swab Summer to the academic year, I realized that I needed to undergo a very significant mental shift of focus in order to be successful in a new environment. There was no longer a need to be on hyper alert to external stimuli like yelling from the cadre – […]
Swabs and Sailing – My Cadre Summer
Cadre Summer was a really exciting time for my class, marking the transition from being a follower and underclassman to a leader. Our summer started out with MCTC, Mid-grade Cadet Training Course, where we got to work with our cadre sections, learning about leadership theories as we developed our own leadership styles. We also had […]
Ella Stolarzyk: Post-AIM Interview
Describe your initial impression of AIM in five words or less. My initial impression of AIM was: tense and competitive, yet motivational. Did all your physical fitness preparation pay off? My physical fitness preparation and training prior to AIM proved to be highly worthwhile! On the second day of AIM, we were given the opportunity […]
Cadre Season is Coming up!
All the 3/c are talking about which cadre they want to be now that cadre summer is slowly approaching. Whether they want to be the cadre who scream their heads off in Chase Hall at Swabs, or waterfront cadre who get to sail around all day, or AIM cadre who get to boss around a […]
Second Family
It’s hard to adjust to new places when you don’t know anyone. That’s usually how it is for most people that come to the Academy. However, one of the benefits of prep school helps that issue by giving you a year to make friends before you attend. Luckily, I met one of my closest friends: […]
Sailing Aboard Eagle on My Third Class Summer
Last summer I was on first phase Eagle for five weeks. This was my second time on Eagle because we spent one week on Eagle over SWAB summer. We departed from New London CT a few days after the end of finals, so it was a very fast transition from the school year to the summer. We packed our sea bags full of […]
Two Cutters, One Summer
The Coast Guard Academy is about the school semesters and the summer training periods. After two long semesters of assignments and homework, people are anxious to go off to their summer assignments. And for a good reason, I loved my third-class summer! It was the most motivational eleven weeks of my cadet experience. Over third-class […]
