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NROTC Students Get A Taste of Marine Life
(June 14, 2011) | 
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Naval Reserve Officers' Training Corps midshipmen explore a Light Armored Vehicle-25 while participating in the annual Career Orientation and Training Midshipmen program, June 2,
2011. The midshipmen participated in various activities aboard Camp Pendleton from static displays to live-fire exercises to better understand the Marine Corps' role in naval services. |
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CAMP PENDLETON, CA (June 10, 2011) -- Nearly 400 Naval Reserve
Officers' Training Corps students from universities across the
country are visiting Camp Pendleton this month to participate in the
annual Career Orientation and Training for Midshipmen program.
Marines from 5th Battalion, 11th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine
Division, are hosting the midshipmen ensuring they see all aspects
of the Corps, from static displays to live-fire exercises.
5/11 will have four different groups of midshipmen training, each
group lasting a week. The first Marine week consisted of training
exercises including patrolling basics, amphibious landings, and
weapons handling.
The orientation program introduces groups
of midshipmen to surface, submarine, aviation, and Marine Corps
warfare specialties a week at a time by visiting different training
locations across Southern California.
“On a larger level the
program exposes the midshipmen to the Marine Air Ground Task Force
and where it fits into naval services,” said Col. Stephen R. Dinauer,
commanding officer of NROTC at the University of Colorado at
Boulder.
The NROTC students also participated in pugil stick
bouts, martial arts instruction and improvised explosive device lane
training.
“It gives them a general orientation of a Marine's
life,” said Capt. Adam C. Gugelmeyer, operations officer for |
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5/11. “The students that I saw were doing great. They were excited
about participating in the events.” |
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This is the first time many midshipmen participate in any type of
combat-oriented training. The week is also the first time most fired
weapons including machine guns and grenade launchers.
“This week
has been very demanding, but very exciting,” said Midshipman 3rd Class
Steven J. Howard, a sophomore at Georgia Institute of Technology. “This
live fire exercise was a lot of fun.”
Howard enrolled into the
NROTC program with eyes set on becoming a commissioned officer in the
Navy. He said after spending this week training with the Marines, it
made him think about choosing to become a Marine officer instead.
“It's totally different from anything I've ever seen before,” said
Howard, 18, from Oakton, Va. “Camp Pendleton is huge, and it's blown my
mind running around it.”
While at Camp Pendleton, midshipmen had
the opportunity to experience military customs and courtesies first hand
as they were mentored by enlisted leaders and junior commissioned
officers. Working with the Marines allowed the midshipmen to understand
how Marine noncommissioned officers work, their mentality, and what they
expected from their leaders.
Dinauer said midshipmen interacted
with NCOs, staff NCOs and junior officers to understand leadership
traits and experience Marines of different ranks working together.
“I've had a lot of things I didn't know explained to me. This is
very intense, much more intense than anything we've done before,” Howard
said. The training he has engaged in for the past week is different from
what he is used to in the classroom.
From firing weapons for the
first time, to establishing a bivouac on a mountain the week formed
experiences most midshipmen might never encounter again.
If the
midshipmen don't serve with the Marine Corps then they at least got a
good of what it's like, Dinauer said.
Founded in 1926, the NROTC
Program was established to educate and train qualified young men and
women for leadership and management positions for service as
commissioned officers in the Navy or Marine Corps. | |
Article and photo by USMC Sgt. Marcy Sanchez
I Marine Expeditionary Force
Copyright 2011
Provided
through DVIDS
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