<p>Hello! I just discovered this forum about 4 days ago. I'm reading through SO MANY posts! I have yet to discover what DS stands for. I've figured out the "S" is for son. We just visited the USNA two weeks ago (yeah, drove from Montana, flying too expensive) and he was very impressed. He's been practicing for the CFA and so far is 15 seconds from maxing the run, has maxed the shuttle, does the average in pull-ups and has a little work to do on sit-ups and push-ups to hit the average. He has nomination requests into both our senators and our one (yes, one) US representative. This is a very foreboding journey we are embarking on, and not much support in rural Montana, so hoping to absorb as much as possible from this and other forums. If anyone has advice for me, my wife and our "DS" PLEASE feel free to share! Thanks everyone!!!</p>
<p>D = “dear.”</p>
<p>And good luck!</p>
<p>The best advice I’ve heard someone give is, “hang on, it’s a wild ride!”</p>
<p>Haven’t applied yet, but everyone I talk to says the best thing to do is to finish up the application ASAP and get DoDMERB completed, nomination requests in, etc. Sounds like he’s doing great! </p>
<p>There’s a great forum called serviceacademyforums.com that I really suggest you join; a lot more people on it than on these academy boards…a lot of the folks on there used to be on here, and there’s 10x the advice on there even, if you think this is good! :)</p>
<p>Best of luck to your DS!</p>
<p>Thanks for the info! I’m already smarter than I was!</p>
<p>there is a service academy forums dot com forum that could be of great use to you. Best of luck and being from Montana could be a good thing in terms of geographic diversity!
Also, there are Candidate Visit weekends in the fall. He might want to try and attend one.</p>
<p>HSG</p>
<p>We will look into the candidate visit weekends. Kind of pricey flying from here though, hence the reason that we drove this summer. We are continuing to work on the CFA, and plan to get the official test out of the way before football season starts the first weekend of September. From our town of 750 people, there have been, I think, eight people gain appointments to SA’s in the last 6 years. Not too bad! So, the fun continues in this great journey! Thanks again.</p>
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That’s something that has to be extended to the candidate from the admissions office, you can’t just sign up for it.</p>
<p>Doug- Sometimes they do have some “leftover” CVWs and if you and/or your son like the Naval Academy admissions page sometimes they’ll say something like, “A couple extra CVWs, let us know if you’re interested” and you can get a freebie that way. If you can afford it and the opportunity exists, I’d recommend he go based on what I’ve heard people say. The candidates get a REAL life view of what being a plebe is like and can ask questions and whatnot.</p>