Last Weekend's Nomination Interview

At 9 am last Saturday, I went to my local Congressman’s office in Annandale, Virginia for a 45 minute long interview. There were two days with three time sessions on each day to do the interview. Each one of the time slots had about three candidates who were being interviewed. I was the first one of the three candidates to arrive at the congressman’s office at around 8:40. The two others showed up before 9 but one of them was almost late. We were greeted by a woman who works for the congressman and then by a member of the Military Academy Nomination selection board. He is a 1967 West Point graduate and further explained how the interviews were going to work. What he explained was how we would interview with three people for fifteen minutes each. Once we were done with each of the three interviews, we could then leave.
I was the first person to be called back by one of the interviewers. He asked me several questions about why I wanted to attend West Point and some more questions about my application file. I was surprised when we finished after only about eight minutes of talking because he didn’t have any more questions for me. He didn’t have to question anything that was in my application file, which is good, and he just asked me to explain some things further to him, such as my Eagle Scout Project, because he was curious and wanted to get to know me better. I have found situations like this good in an interview when they can discuss things other than the basic requirements for admissions to the academy, because it means that he thinks I have met all of the requirements and just wants to know what type of person I am.
The second person who interviewed me was a retired Colonel who I had known from applying last year. He was very friendly with me, and asked me how things were going. He, just like all of the other interviewers mentioned how strong of a candidate I was, and hardly talked about my application file, and focused more on me as an individual. We discussed college for a while and how well my classes were going this year, as well as scouting. He had been involved with scouting, but couldn’t earn the rank of Eagle Scout when he was younger because his family was having financial problems and he had to get a full time job to support them. We talked about the Order of the Arrow, which is scouting’s honor society, and which I have been awarded the highest honor in the organization. I was surprised to find out that he was a “Brotherhood” member, and he was very impressed that I had earned the Vigil Honor, which is the highest honor. We talked for the entire fifteen minutes and he wished me good luck, and said that he thought I should have gotten in last year and that he was sure I would have no problems getting in this year.
I was not surprised by what every one of the three interviewers asked me. Each one had asked me why I didn’t get in the first time. Each of them were surprised that I hadn’t gotten in, and wanted to know if the admissions team at West Point had informed me why I wasn’t selected. I told them that I had failed the running event on the Candidate Fitness Assessment the first time I took it last year, and my Regional Commander had informed me that it had pushed me far enough away from failing that one event and having to retake it, that it kept me out of the academy that year. I was only about 20 people away from getting in. They rank every person applying and accept them based on that ranking. This year, I had greatly improved my CFA scores and maxed out on several of the events, and they were very impressed with my new scores.
The third person who interviewed me was another retired officer. She was impressed like all of the other interviewers. She had commented on how good my recommendation letters were, but focused on one of them, which was written by my AP Physics teacher from high school. She was a West Point graduate in the class of 1999 and served in combat in Iraq two years ago. She had written about how she thought I would make a great combat officer, and the interviewer was really impressed that a combat veteran had said that I would make a great combat officer.
After the interview was over, I find out that the West Point graduate who was greeting people worked with people that my dad knew, so he was talking with my dad for the entire time. That man is also in the group of people who decides who receive a nomination, so hopefully having talked with my dad for 45 minutes, he will think positively about me even though he didn’t interview with me. I received a nomination last year from this same group of people, so I think that I should receive one this year as well since all of my scores have gone up.
My congressman has decided to let West Point rank the people applying for nominations in his district so they can evaluate who are the most qualified for admissions to the academy. This is really good because politics no longer is a factor in who gets a nomination, and since I have a good relationship with my Regional Commander, who is one of the people who gets to make the decision now, I think that I am even more likely to receive a nomination and an appointment from West Point.