Reasons to Serve

[Shoelaces]

This post is mostly meant to pick the brains of veterans. I have been born and raised adjacent to Ft. Campbell and all of the men in my family for the past 4 generations have served in the armed services. I personally fiddled with the idea for several years as I watched many of my best friends and older brothers enlist in the Army. Now that I have grown and lived my own experience and dipped my toes into the real world I think I can muster an answer as to why I want to serve other than the overwhelming feeling that I will regret it if I don't. I think challenging oneself in all areas of your life and real deal struggling brings out traits in one's character that I find admirable. Who would want to do something because it's easy? In my experience working with veterans as a volunteer I often hear stories about how few opportunities they had before enlisting or how enlisting helped them overcome some type of struggle in their own life. I am extremely proud of my community and the fact that I am an Army brat. And my closing question is why did you choose to serve? What drove that impulse?

 

[millitaryfan]

Those are all very good thoughts and questions. I don’t have any experience with SA, so I can’t say much. However, as a prof. at a tier 1 university, I also serve on the undergrads admissions and scholarship committee. When reviewing essays, we are looking for something genuine, not what the applicants ”guess” we would like to hear. All you have listed here, if well articulated and substantiated, will make a great essay. But, again I‘m not in any way related to the military except that some of my research is funded by DoD.