I hire a fair amount of early career professionals (not entry level but not mid-career) and hands down my best hires have been service academy grads. Super focused, incredibly smart, plug and play into any team situation, and natural leaders.

And, knowing only a few people per state get in, the competition is incredibly fierce.

They are also generally healthy and thus don't sap our rising health care costs.

Anonymous wrote:I grew up on the West Coast and attended a private prep school and frankly never heard of West Point or Annapolis until I moved to Washington, DC.

Who is hiring their grads?

I wish I knew the name of the prep school, so I had an example of an expensive prep school that's doing an awful job of teaching basic cultural literacy.

I do not come from a military family or the DC area and I always thought they were very prestigious and selective.

My father was a USNA grad. He served in the Air Force (I don't think people graduate from Top 10 schools elsewhere go on to serve. They just go to work.) for 10 years. He was a combat pilot, received the Distinguished Flying Cross in Vietnam. He went on to law school and stayed in the AF Reserve for another twenty years while practicing law. There was an issue of the ABA Journal I picked up when I was a teen that was on the kitchen counter profiling military reserve lawyers. Most were desk jockeys doing JAG work. My Dad was still flying planes. He quipped: "I'm a pilot with a legal avocation." Plus, that Reserve check put three kids through college.

Anonymous wrote:So two were nerdy engineer types and two were combat leaders. Nice!

Um....Harvard and Yale are FULL of nerdy types...what's a few more?

Lots of similar discussion here from a few months ago.
http://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/712841.page

So two were nerdy engineer types and two were combat leaders. Nice!

Anonymous wrote:The Air Force Academy isn't all that prestigious, but West Point and Annapolis are. But it's still very specialized. Grads concentrate in engineering, defense contracting, etc. I've heard from others that they have a fairly low percentage who go on to professional schools, largely because they have multi-year service commitments and a lot of them end up getting married too, are fairly far along in their careers when they finally go civilian.

In terms of prestige, I would put them a notch or two below the ivy league foremost employers. But for some employers, particularly those in the defense industry, probably a notch above.

I had four Naval Academy grads in my section (of 80 people) at Harvard Business School. Two submarine guys, one marine, and one Navy Seal.

Anonymous wrote:I grew up on the West Coast and attended a private prep school and frankly never heard of West Point or Annapolis until I moved to Washington, DC.

Who is hiring their grads?

You are kidding, correct?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I grew up on the West Coast and attended a private prep school and frankly never heard of West Point or Annapolis until I moved to Washington, DC.

Who is hiring their grads?

You can’t be serious.

Very large corporations called the Army, the Navy, and the Air Force. Perhaps you've heard of them...

+1 well stated

Some are very, very smart and others are not.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The Air Force Academy isn't all that prestigious, but West Point and Annapolis are. But it's still very specialized. Grads concentrate in engineering, defense contracting, etc. I've heard from others that they have a fairly low percentage who go on to professional schools, largely because they have multi-year service commitments and a lot of them end up getting married too, are fairly far along in their careers when they finally go civilian.

In terms of prestige, I would put them a notch or two below the ivy league foremost employers. But for some employers, particularly those in the defense industry, probably a notch above.

Maybe the ones who exit as soon as their military commitment is done don’t go on to additional schooling,but career officers usually have multiple masters degrees by the time they retire. They may not be from top 10 schools but they are often given a year just to focus on school. Heck, my FIL got an MBA from UVA in the Air Force and went on to get PhD in economics from Wharton way back in the 60s.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The Air Force Academy isn't all that prestigious, but West Point and Annapolis are. But it's still very specialized. Grads concentrate in engineering, defense contracting, etc. I've heard from others that they have a fairly low percentage who go on to professional schools, largely because they have multi-year service commitments and a lot of them end up getting married too, are fairly far along in their careers when they finally go civilian.

In terms of prestige, I would put them a notch or two below the ivy league foremost employers. But for some employers, particularly those in the defense industry, probably a notch above.

Maybe the ones who exit as soon as their military commitment is done don’t go on to additional schooling,but career officers usually have multiple masters degrees by the time they retire. They may not be from top 10 schools but they are often given a year just to focus on school. Heck, my FIL got an MBA from UVA in the Air Force and went on to get PhD in economics from Wharton way back in the 60s.

I agree on their graduates not being in top professional schools. I had only one service academy grad in my law school class, and I just asked my wife about her medical school class and she had none. We were both in top 10 schools.

I personally know service academy graduates with PhDs from Harvard, Princeton, Chicago, and Oxford, so you and your wife are pretty ignorant.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I grew up on the West Coast and attended a private prep school and frankly never heard of West Point or Annapolis until I moved to Washington, DC.

Who is hiring their grads?

You can’t be serious.

Very large corporations called the Army, the Navy, and the Air Force. Perhaps you've heard of them...

No student loans gives you a leg up in life. https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bizjournals.com/baltimore/news/2017/08/30/if-you-want-to-earn-a-high-salary-go-to-the-naval.amp.html