Military academy applications rise sharply, but the cheap education has nothing to do with it
This year college applications to military academies have skyrocketed, climbing a whopping 40 per cent at the Naval Academy at Annapolis. Apparently, the fact that America is in a war hasn’t deterred thousands of young men and women from applying to a military academy. For most people, going to college means thousands of dollars of debt. The essentially free ride you get at a military academy is tempting, nay, mouth-watering. Not only is room and board on the house, you actually get paid to go to with yearly stipends from the military academy.
The best though, is that military officials, long known for their obtuse grasp of civvie life, maintain that the economy can’t be the main reason for the spike in applications to military academies. Reason given? School officials said students tended to have very personal reasons for applying to military academies: patriotism, an abiding interest in the military as a profession, a desire to follow in a parent’s footsteps. Awww, patriotism, cute. What did they think, applicants would give their real reasons for applying, the dirt cheap college education hook up? The stipends in the thousands of dollars? For anyone that has written or is planning to write an admissions essay, you know it’s all about seeming passionate and telling them what they want to hear.
Others apparent reasons for the increase in applications seen at every military academy is the declining casualties in Iraq and Obama’s new policies. The military has also been pursuing an aggressive ad campaign, with billboards at major airports across the country.
If you can’t bear the idea of wearing the same outfit as everyone else and you’re not a morning person, then maybe a military academy isn’t your thing, no matter how cheap it is. Lots of non-military schools offer financial aid, you can check out our financial aid calculator to see what you might get. Don’t be surprised if you don’t find a better price. And don’t forget that at a military academy not only do you get a sweet ride financially, you might get to do cool stuff like jump out of planes and shoot people.
This entry was posted on Friday, June 19th, 2009 at 3:04 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
