CFA Administrator question

Hi, All-

DS is dragging his feet on doing his CFA. I'm certain it's because he's afraid he won't do well, even though he has been practicing and working out. He was unable to do more than two pull-ups last spring and now can do eight, so there's definitely been improvement!

At any rate, obviously he MUST do his CFA, and the sooner the better. My question is regarding who can administer the test. We have a neighbor who is an active triathlete, and coaches a triathlon club as well as a youth soccer team. He does not have a Phys Ed degree (he's an engineer in real life). Is he qualified, or must DS get a PE teacher from school?

Thank you for your advice!

MaybeMidMom said:

Hi, All-

DS is dragging his feet on doing his CFA. I'm certain it's because he's afraid he won't do well, even though he has been practicing and working out. He was unable to do more than two pull-ups last spring and now can do eight, so there's definitely been improvement!

At any rate, obviously he MUST do his CFA, and the sooner the better. My question is regarding who can administer the test. We have a neighbor who is an active triathlete, and coaches a triathlon club as well as a youth soccer team. He does not have a Phys Ed degree (he's an engineer in real life). Is he qualified, or must DS get a PE teacher from school?

Thank you for your advice!

Click to expand...

I'll leave it to others with actual knowledge to answer your question. Just wanted to point out that 'the sooner the better' isn't necessarily the case. He should be shooting to submit the best application possible in the time allotted. If he needs it complete prior to a nom interview then that's the target date. If he's still working and improving, it may be smart to postpone for a bit if possible.

CFA should be done by his HS gym teacher or certified trainer.Email has to be sent to him thru the academy.You provide the email address to the academy and he fills out when complete.Good Luck!

The CFA instructions are very clear:

The CFA MUST be administered by a high school/prep school physical education teacher, team coach, commissioned officer (for military candidates), or the candidate's Blue and Gold Officer.

Click to expand...

A certified trainer is not one of those options.

I didn't even think a coach could do it (unless he/she was a certified gym teacher as well)

At DS's school, you either do PE or ROTC. DS does ROTC, so he has no certified PE teacher. He asked his admissions counselor and he said either one of DS's varsity coaches or an ROTC instructor could do it. He had to email the person's name to the counselor who then sent the link to the ROTC instructor.

Maybe,

I feel your pain. DS waited and waited, it was the last step in the hurdle and I kept hounding him until finally I asked if he really was serious about attending. Even his "training" was sub-par IMHO.

He had his scores submitted by his Senior ROTC instructor, who initially suggested he train harder after identifying weaknesses and would hold off a month before submitting to USNA. SIX weeks later, finally, they retested and scores were submitted. He marginally improved.

This was nerve wracking for me and I could not understand the lack of desire to train harder to do his best. Chalked this up to "typical teen" I guess.

Long story short, it worked out for the most part. He's had trouble with shin splints, but that seems to be improving. He's far more motivated now and has dramatically improved his times over the submitted CFA.

I guess plebe summer does wonders for attitude and desire eh? Keep the faith!

Rufus said:

CFA should be done by his HS gym teacher or certified trainer.Email has to be sent to him thru the academy.You provide the email address to the academy and he fills out when complete.Good Luck!

Click to expand...

WARNING: We made a mistake of mistyping my sons's high school baseball coach's email address in CIS (Candidate Information System). He had a fairly cryptic email address and it was simply entered incorrectly. It took a long time to figure that out and correct it. You cannot go back into CIS and correct it, either. Once you hit the "Enter" key - that's it. Once we got it figured out, it took a call to the Admissions Officer to fix it.

Word to the wise, make sure the email addresses you enter in CIS (also for the Math and English teachers) are correct. It could delay the completion of your application significantly unless you realize your mistake right away. It's not always obvious why they are not getting the email.

Thank you very much for all the advice! I will tell DS we have to be super-careful with the email addresses - ugh, that would be lousy to fix. He's going to ask the school principal, who knows and likes him, which PE teacher he should approach. I hope that will give him more confidence about the test.

This whole process is so nerve-wracking for kids and parents alike. I literally wake up at 5:00 AM in a panic over something I think he needs to do. Glad we can ask questions here, and thanks again!

MaybeMidMom said:

Thank you very much for all the advice! I will tell DS we have to be super-careful with the email addresses - ugh, that would be lousy to fix. He's going to ask the school principal, who knows and likes him, which PE teacher he should approach. I hope that will give him more confidence about the test.

This whole process is so nerve-wracking for kids and parents alike. I literally wake up at 5:00 AM in a panic over something I think he needs to do. Glad we can ask questions here, and thanks again!

Click to expand...

Deep breaths. It's much more productive. There is a lot to do, but nothing to go crazy about. Small steps.

MaybeMidMom said:

...
This whole process is so nerve-wracking for kids and parents alike. I literally wake up at 5:00 AM in a panic over something I think he needs to do. Glad we can ask questions here, and thanks again!

Click to expand...

My MID made a spreadsheet with all of the things needed for the application and nominations, including deadlines. That way it was right in front of her at all times - actually it was all over our dining room table. (Yes, I peaked at it to satisfy myself that nothing had been left off. )