Current Female CO 2024 - It's that time again! Ask me anything!

Greeneye22 said:
If someone chooses Humanities courses does he have to do math, physics, or biology? How much should I expect? (I would like to attend the International Affairs Major). Can someone do two Majors? which languages can be studied at West Point? Thank you for taking the time to answer :)
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Hello!

This question is actually right up my alley - I am currently double majoring in Russian and International Affairs here at USMA (just declared about two weeks ago).

To answer your first question, yes, all cadets are required to do some level of math and basic sciences, because all USMA cadets will graduate with a bachelor of science degree. This means that all cadets are required to take pre-calculus, calculus, statistics, economics, computer science, chemistry, and physics, at the very minimum. If you are looking at being a humanities major, that is about what you should expect. In addition to that, you will also have to take an engineering track (usually 3-5 courses, depending on the track), and those courses are engineering-based, and therefore STEM courses.

To answer the last two questions in a two-in-one, yes, cadets can double major! It’s most common in the humanities - International Affairs and Languages are very common, because there’s a lot of course overlap, but loads of majors allow for a double major. There are also plenty of minors available here at West Point if a double major isn’t right for you, but you are interested in another course of study. The languages offered here to major in are as follows: Arabic, Chinese, French, German, Persian, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish.

I hope this answers all of your questions!
 
usmacadet2024 said:
Hello!

This question is actually right up my alley - I am currently double majoring in Russian and International Affairs here at USMA (just declared about two weeks ago).

To answer your first question, yes, all cadets are required to do some level of math and basic sciences, because all USMA cadets will graduate with a bachelor of science degree. This means that all cadets are required to take pre-calculus, calculus, statistics, economics, computer science, chemistry, and physics, at the very minimum. If you are looking at being a humanities major, that is about what you should expect. In addition to that, you will also have to take an engineering track (usually 3-5 courses, depending on the track), and those courses are engineering-based, and therefore STEM courses.

To answer the last two questions in a two-in-one, yes, cadets can double major! It’s most common in the humanities - International Affairs and Languages are very common, because there’s a lot of course overlap, but loads of majors allow for a double major. There are also plenty of minors available here at West Point if a double major isn’t right for you, but you are interested in another course of study. The languages offered here to major in are as follows: Arabic, Chinese, French, German, Persian, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish.

I hope this answers all of your questions!
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For your language choice, did you come in wanting to pursue Russian and perform well enough on whatever language proficiency test you have to take or do you get a top three or two that West Point then chooses for you?
 
usmacadet2024 said:
Hello!

This question is actually right up my alley - I am currently double majoring in Russian and International Affairs here at USMA (just declared about two weeks ago).

To answer your first question, yes, all cadets are required to do some level of math and basic sciences, because all USMA cadets will graduate with a bachelor of science degree. This means that all cadets are required to take pre-calculus, calculus, statistics, economics, computer science, chemistry, and physics, at the very minimum. If you are looking at being a humanities major, that is about what you should expect. In addition to that, you will also have to take an engineering track (usually 3-5 courses, depending on the track), and those courses are engineering-based, and therefore STEM courses.

To answer the last two questions in a two-in-one, yes, cadets can double major! It’s most common in the humanities - International Affairs and Languages are very common, because there’s a lot of course overlap, but loads of majors allow for a double major. There are also plenty of minors available here at West Point if a double major isn’t right for you, but you are interested in another course of study. The languages offered here to major in are as follows: Arabic, Chinese, French, German, Persian, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish.

I hope this answers all of your questions!
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Thank you very much for your answer, I speak like a native speaker a language that is not on the list, can I do this language on request?
I come from another country and I’m still trying to understand fully how it works, now that I read the documentation and your answer I have a clearer idea of how it’s structured. If I go bad in Math for example, but I get A+ in subjects such as International relations, History and so on …
is there the possibility to take extra classes to better understand math? How penalized I would be?

I will be very strong in (in the sense that I’m very passionate about these subjects and/or I feel that I can do very good):

Philosophy/ ethical reasoning
Political science
International Relations
History 1/2/3
Foreign Language 1
Psychology
Constitutional/Military Law
Military Leadership
Officership
Literature
Military science 1/2/3
Composition
Physical geography

Normal in:

Foreign Language 2
Cyber 1
Cyber 2
Statistics
Economics
English Sequences 1/2/3
DPE 1/2/3/4/5/6/7/8/9

I would struggle in:

Chemistry 1
Math 1
Physics 1
Math modeling
Biology
 
AmericanFKP12 said:
For your language choice, did you come in wanting to pursue Russian and perform well enough on whatever language proficiency test you have to take or do you get a top three or two that West Point then chooses for you?
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I knew that I wanted to be a Russian major before I even got accepted to West Point - I was applying to other colleges for that major as well. For prep, I did do some individual tutoring via Skype during quarantine as a hobby/prep. I did also do very well on the proficiency test, which helped me get placed into my language of choice. It’s also not common for plebes to get into a language class their first year unless they have high proficiency and show interest, so I emailed the Russian Department Head to let him know that I was interested and I wanted to major in it. All of these things combined helped me get into Russian my plebe year. You organize all the languages in order of most wanted to least wanted, then West Point usually just pics one of the top two or three that you have, unless you express interest in being a major for that language.

Let me know if you have any more questions!
 
Greeneye22 said:
Thank you very much for your answer, I speak like a native speaker a language that is not on the list, can I do this language on request?
I come from another country and I’m still trying to understand fully how it works, now that I read the documentation and your answer I have a clearer idea of how it’s structured. If I go bad in Math for example, but I get A+ in subjects such as International relations, History and so on …
is there the possibility to take extra classes to better understand math? How penalized I would be?

I will be very strong in (in the sense that I’m very passionate about these subjects and/or I feel that I can do very good):

Philosophy/ ethical reasoning
Political science
International Relations
History 1/2/3
Foreign Language 1
Psychology
Constitutional/Military Law
Military Leadership
Officership
Literature
Military science 1/2/3
Composition
Physical geography

Normal in:

Foreign Language 2
Cyber 1
Cyber 2
Statistics
Economics
English Sequences 1/2/3
DPE 1/2/3/4/5/6/7/8/9

I would struggle in:

Chemistry 1
Math 1
Physics 1
Math modeling
Biology
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So, you probably won't be able to take that language to replace the others unless there happens to be an instructor here who spoke the language and would be willing to work with you on it. And even then, I'm not sure it would replace the required language credit from one of the already offered languages - it might just be something you could do in addition to the required language course.

In terms of math classes vs other classes, etc, I am not totally sure what you mean, so I'll answer a few questions. If you do poorly on math in high school, or secondary school (whatever you may call it in the country you are from!), it will be hard to get an appointment to any of the service academies. Generally, you'll need at least As and Bs (or the equivalent) to get into a service academy. However, if you are referring to placement in courses at USMA, there are levels of required courses. For example, there are three tiers of math courses that you could take your plebe year - rock math (which is essentially algebra), the standard math courses (pre-calc to calculus), and then jedi (advanced) math. You take a placement test prior to arrival or during Beast that will place you into one of these math tracks. So, if you struggle a little bit in math, they will give you algebra before they will give you pre-calculus or calculus with no penalty. I'm not sure the same stands for physics and chemistry, however. I would really focus on understanding math, physics, and chem concepts before applying - that's what I had to do to make sure that I looked as appealing as possible to admissions.

Essentially, the easier you can make it for yourself, the better you will be off. If you're placed in a lower-level math class, that's fine, but it just means that's an extra class you'll have to take here, and trust me when I say that's not something you want to do unless absolutely necessary.

I hope this answers your question!
 
usmacadet2024 said:
So, you probably won't be able to take that language to replace the others unless there happens to be an instructor here who spoke the language and would be willing to work with you on it. And even then, I'm not sure it would replace the required language credit from one of the already offered languages - it might just be something you could do in addition to the required language course.

In terms of math classes vs other classes, etc, I am not totally sure what you mean, so I'll answer a few questions. If you do poorly on math in high school, or secondary school (whatever you may call it in the country you are from!), it will be hard to get an appointment to any of the service academies. Generally, you'll need at least As and Bs (or the equivalent) to get into a service academy. However, if you are referring to placement in courses at USMA, there are levels of required courses. For example, there are three tiers of math courses that you could take your plebe year - rock math (which is essentially algebra), the standard math courses (pre-calc to calculus), and then jedi (advanced) math. You take a placement test prior to arrival or during Beast that will place you into one of these math tracks. So, if you struggle a little bit in math, they will give you algebra before they will give you pre-calculus or calculus with no penalty. I'm not sure the same stands for physics and chemistry, however. I would really focus on understanding math, physics, and chem concepts before applying - that's what I had to do to make sure that I looked as appealing as possible to admissions.

Essentially, the easier you can make it for yourself, the better you will be off. If you're placed in a lower-level math class, that's fine, but it just means that's an extra class you'll have to take here, and trust me when I say that's not something you want to do unless absolutely necessary.

I hope this answers your question!
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Yes I have a B+ in math and straight A's in all the other subjects, I had to put a lot of effort to get this grade from a C in the first year of High School, what scares me is that only for this subject I could be rejected (they said that I have very good extracurriculars/athletics and I calculated a 3.89 GPA and I'm probably the 1° or 2° in my class and one of the top 5 students in my school), What arguments of Math, Physics and Biology do you generally study in the first year? (Thank you very much for taking the time to answer :))
 
usmacadet2024 said:
Hey guys!

It's me again - I've posted on this forum before, probably 2 or 3 months ago, and answered any questions that y'all had about West Point, R-Day, being a plebe, etc. I figured it was probably time for another one, considering so many of you are receiving your appointments, or are anxiously awaiting news!

So, feel free to ask me any questions about my experience here, any advice, or just anything you can think of! I'd be happy to help!

Best,

USMA C/O 2024
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What has been your experience with prior enlisted folk? I know they typically struggle with numbers and the academic realm for obvious reasons. But do they make up for it in training? Even then, are they fit to be officers?
 
Greeneye22 said:
Yes I have a B+ in math and straight A's in all the other subjects, I had to put a lot of effort to get this grade from a C in the first year of High School, what scares me is that only for this subject I could be rejected (they said that I have very good extracurriculars/athletics and I calculated a 3.89 GPA and I'm probably the 1° or 2° in my class and one of the top 5 students in my school), What arguments of Math, Physics and Biology do you generally study in the first year? (Thank you very much for taking the time to answer :))
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The first year it depends, but the standard track is pre-calculus and calculus for math your first year. The sciences are usually spread out between your first and second year. Physics is just a standard, entry-level physics course, as is the same for chemistry and biology. Sorry it's not an in-depth answer, there's just not much to break down here!
 
usmacadet2024 said:
The first year it depends, but the standard track is pre-calculus and calculus for math your first year. The sciences are usually spread out between your first and second year. Physics is just a standard, entry-level physics course, as is the same for chemistry and biology. Sorry it's not an in-depth answer, there's just not much to break down here!
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Thanks for the information :)
 
Can you share information about putting your name on your clothing? Did you use stencil or did you sew name tags onto your clothing. If your clothing is dark colored, how did you put your name on those item?

Can a Cadet remain at WP during some of the normal vacation or holidays? (Thanksgiving for example) If so, are they allowed to use the library, labs, and other resources to study?
 
NesherVII said:
Can you share information about putting your name on your clothing? Did you use stencil or did you sew name tags onto your clothing. If your clothing is dark colored, how did you put your name on those item?

Can a Cadet remain at WP during some of the normal vacation or holidays? (Thanksgiving for example) If so, are they allowed to use the library, labs, and other resources to study?
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I just wrote my name on everything in Sharpie! Usually, if the clothing is dark-colored, there are typically light-colored tags that you can write your name on. For things like socks, it's best to sew uniquely colored patterns, or x's, or something like that, on the toe seam (at least, that's what my mom did for me, and it worked perfectly)! I can imagine sewing name tags would likely work about the same though, if you would like to put that much effort into it.

And cadets can remain at USMA for any of the normal vacations or holidays, and some resources will still be open and available. I believe the library stays open, but I'm not sure that the labs and such will. However, you can expect that these will have different operating hours than normal.

Hope this helps!
 
usmacadet2024 said:
I just wrote my name on everything in Sharpie! Usually, if the clothing is dark-colored, there are typically light-colored tags that you can write your name on. For things like socks, it's best to sew uniquely colored patterns, or x's, or something like that, on the toe seam (at least, that's what my mom did for me, and it worked perfectly)! I can imagine sewing name tags would likely work about the same though, if you would like to put that much effort into it.

And cadets can remain at USMA for any of the normal vacations or holidays, and some resources will still be open and available. I believe the library stays open, but I'm not sure that the labs and such will. However, you can expect that these will have different operating hours than normal.

Hope this helps!
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Thank you for your response. I have a few more questions.

1 - What exactly is the initial fitness test at Beast? Is it the APFT, the ACFT, or a combination of both?

2 - How soon can cadet candidates at Beast receive packages? I'd like to send a package of items needed for Beast to arrive within the first week.

3 - Parents purchase a pair of boots and low-quarters before Beast, and Cadet Candidates are issued another pair of each upon arrival? Is that correct?

4 - If Cadet Candidates wear glasses, do they receive a pair of RX glasses upon arrival? Should they bring contacts?

5 - Are Tactical Gloves allowed and used for designated trainings at Beast?

6 - Are company assignments all male/female, or are the companies mixed?

7 - How often are the cadet candidates in tents during BEAST? How many packages of make-up wipes or baby wipes or both should cadet candidates bring for when they are out in the field?
 
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NesherVII said:
Thank you for your response. I have a few more questions.

1 - What exactly is the initial fitness test at Beast? Is it the APFT, the ACFT, or a combination of both?

2 - How soon can cadet candidates at Beast receive packages? I'd like to send a package of items needed for Beast to arrive within the first week.

3 - Parents purchase a pair of boots and low-quarters before Beast, and Cadet Candidates are issued another pair of each upon arrival? Is that correct?

4 - If Cadet Candidates wear glasses, do they receive a pair of RX glasses upon arrival? Should they bring contacts?

5 - Are Tactical Gloves allowed and used for designated trainings at Beast?

6 - Are company assignments all male/female, or are the companies mixed?

7 - How often are the cadet candidates in tents during BEAST? How many packages of make-up wipes or baby wipes or both should cadet candidates bring for when they are out in the field?
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1. This year it was a modified ACFT (hand-release push-ups, leg tucks, and a two miler), but I don't know what it'll look like this year
2. This depends on your Beast leadership. My squad leader didn't take us to the mailroom until the end of the first week, but don't be afraid to ask if you can go to the mailroom. My recommendation is bring what you'll need for the first week. By then you should be able to get to the mailroom (hopefully)
3. You do get issued another pair of each
4. You can't wear contacts during Beast. I'm pretty sure cadets were issued glasses if they needed it, but I'm not 100% sure
5. Yes, you'll be issued a pair of tactical gloves
6. Companies are mixed
7. You never use a tent during beast. You're either living in the barracks (when at West Point), in the bays (at Camp Buckner), or sleeping in a sleeping bag (during your FTX). It depends on the length of your FTX. One package was good for my 5-day FTX
 
BeastBarracks2024USMA said:
1. This year it was a modified ACFT (hand-release push-ups, leg tucks, and a two miler), but I don't know what it'll look like this year
2. This depends on your Beast leadership. My squad leader didn't take us to the mailroom until the end of the first week, but don't be afraid to ask if you can go to the mailroom. My recommendation is bring what you'll need for the first week. By then you should be able to get to the mailroom (hopefully)
3. You do get issued another pair of each
4. You can't wear contacts during Beast. I'm pretty sure cadets were issued glasses if they needed it, but I'm not 100% sure
5. Yes, you'll be issued a pair of tactical gloves
6. Companies are mixed
7. You never use a tent during beast. You're either living in the barracks (when at West Point), in the bays (at Camp Buckner), or sleeping in a sleeping bag (during your FTX). It depends on the length of your FTX. One package was good for my 5-day FTX
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From a parent, we were told no packages could be received at all during Beast without specific approval by your Cadre.
 
Fiona1124 said:
From a parent, we were told no packages could be received at all during Beast without specific approval by your Cadre.
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You can send things on the approved lists you get that you can bring with you on RDay. You cannot send anything that is not on the lists. You can mail cards with a photo or newspaper clippings. You can send all sizes and colors of cards, the plain white envelope requirement is a myth.
 
What is the purpose of the fitness test on R-Day? Does the test count towards some type of grade/evaluation? Does this evaluation have an impact on your GPA for the academic year?
 
BeastBarracks2024USMA said:
No, but they do take your height, weight, and some blood. Also, if Covid is still around by R-Day, you'll get a Covid test as well.
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During the height, weight, and blood draw possibly unbeknownst to new cadets, you are given a once over for tattoos and any scars that may indicate an injury or corrective surgery since Dodmerb medical.
 
fdavis2025 said:
What is the purpose of the fitness test on R-Day? Does the test count towards some type of grade/evaluation? Does this evaluation have an impact on your GPA for the academic year?
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The fitness test is usually the day after R-Day, and it has absolutely NO bearing on your GPA for the academic year or any part of your time in Beast. According to the little I've heard from west point, it's sort of for you to gauge where you are in terms of army fitness. But someone please correct me if I'm wrong!
 
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