<p>I wanted to take a moment to publicly thank USMMA and all of you for sharing a peek at what INDOC is like for our kids. </p>
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<p>To Ens Fulton and WYLT/kponline.shutterfly.com :
Thanks for all the pictures, and even a few video clips of the 'cheer off'.</p>
<p>Like all parents, I dutifully search to see if there's any shot of "my kid" somewhere in all those candidates. You had impossible odds... each parent wants a shot of their kid. 1 chance in 282 = 1 chance to get it 'right', 281 chances NOT to. But I've enjoyed searching for my kid, the others from our state, and finally... just seeing what they're all up to.</p>
<p>You have gone around to so many activities and captured our kids in activities WE haven't seen them do! Sailing, Gumby (orange suit) practicing in the pool, firing 9mm pistols, running some, running some more (sweaty), running some more still (drenched and painfully slogging to finish), drilling, LISTENING to the crystal goblet lady, hustling to make up their racks(:eek: "beds"), washing (:eek: :eek:) clothes, ironing (:eek: :eek: :eek:) clothes, memorizing knowledge, swimming, cheering, etc.</p>
<p>I have watched them ALL grow more confident, more poised, more determined as the days have passed. There is less "they're trying to KILL me" looks during the leg-lifts exercising, and more determination that "I know I CAN get through this". </p>
<p>And none of us would have had that chance if YOU guys hadn't go through the effort of capturing those images on our behalf.<br>
My sincerest thanks for doing that job !</p>
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<p>And to the DIs :</p>
<p>Their job is to make these Candidates worthy of being Plebe Candidates by the time the upperclassmen returned. To teach them how to square things away, how to become better focused and disciplined, and to begin "learning how to learn and operate not just individually (that's what high school did), but as a whole platoon, a whole company, a whole CLASS.</p>
<p>The candidates thought they had the hardest job. Nope. Yours is. YOU are the ones who had to get up earlier, be completely poised and squared away, do all the exercises, ratchet up their stress level while maintaining your own, ensure all your charges were doing what they were supposed to do, keep everyone heading in the same direction (even when serious events conspired to derail plans--4th co virus), enforce lights out, and plan for the next day's activities while your charges slept. </p>
<p>I'd bet the DIs need a few days off to recover, before starting THEIR academics!</p>
<p>For us in our home, we only have to deal with a small number of high school seniors. For the DIs, they just inherited 60 kids. Imagine , 60 new "toddlers", who like ducks, have imprinted on the DIs and ask them everything! Why we didn't see DI's with earplugs I'll never know.</p>
<p>It must have been just like that expression "Herding Cats".
But, you know what... they DID it. </p>
<p>If you saw the marching Friday, then you know. They did remarkably well. As VADM Stewart said, paraphrased (you may not have been able to hear)... "You've done this in 2 weeks. At the Naval Academy, it takes them 6 weeks to get it right. At the Coast Guard Academy, they never do. :D )</p>
<p>So, the DIs aren't just responsible for getting them to march. They are responsible for the determination I see in so many of the photograpsh.</p>
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<p>And to the DoIT:
All of this is facilitated by you guys. I really like that I have a chance to enjoy a flavor of what the kids are going through during INDOC. You have made this easily available to parents across the nation. It is an intelligent and non-trivial way to leverage technology to it's best advantage -- helping us stay connected in the process, and eliminating needless concern. </p>
<p>All this IN ADDITION TO getting a mountain of laptops/ printers/ thumbdrives/ etc ready to be used. </p>
<p>( I hope you can post the video feed from the procession, for parents who were not able to be near a computer at 1600 on Friday).</p>
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<p>To all of you parents, these are the most thankless of tasks in servant leadership -- doing the jobs that must be done.. despite no positive recognition of that fact. </p>
<p>Therefore, to all of you with thankless jobs, *a huge and heartfelt "THANK YOU! GREAT JOB!" with appreciation from all the parents and friends! *</p>