Professor O'Neil:
I hope the semester ended well for you, and I apologize for not having written sooner. From the time my flight touched down in New York on Memorial Day the United States Merchant Marine Academy (USMMA, or Kings Point) has treated me excellently and has easily surpassed my expectations.
It took me about a week to actually semi-fully understand Kings Point. Although Kings Point is a federal service academy and requires a senators nomination just as the other four federal academies do, it is the only one not operated by the Department of Defense. The United States Merchant Marine Academy is instead operated by the United States Maritime Administration (MARAD), which is of course a division of the Department of Transportation. At the same time though academy graduates have the option of becoming commissioned as officers in any of the branches of the military. The service obligation upon graduation is seven years in a military reserve service (most choose Navy as you may imagine), but it is also serving five years in the United States maritime industry. Despite MARAD technically operating the academy it is very much a federal service academy as Midshipmen are required to be in military style uniform throughout the day. Even when not in uniform they have matching workout and casual apparel (It makes fitting in rather difficult as you may imagine).
The reason I explain of all of this is because it makes Kings Point unique, as it is an environment in which Federal Bureaucracy, Military, and Academia meet with a unique result. The campus itself is located on Long Island, in a region once known as the "Gold Coast."
The building I work in was once Walter Chrysler's summer vacation home before it was purchased by the federal government in 1942. It is supposedly the inspiration for F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby.
As for actual responsibilities, in addition to learning a great deal about the Maritime industry (a vastly overlooked industry), and learning a great deal of acronyms for various federal institutions, I am primarily assisting the Public Affairs office in planning both Graduation and Indoctrination in July. I am currently primarily managing the VIP list for this Monday's graduation. As you know this year's speaker is Senator John McCain, and in attendance will be approximately 200 VIPs including the Secretary of Transportation, Generals and Admirals from all of the branches of the armed services. My experience here has given me not only an impression of logistics and planning for large events, but also (and more importantly in my mind) has shown me a great deal of how to conduct oneself in an environment with a heavy military influence. In just several weeks I have realized just how special Kings Point is.
I saw New York City for the first time aboard a 78 foot custom built Yacht with two Assistant Secretaries of the Air Force. Like a true Politics major I found myself nervous and giddy to be able to talk on a personal level with high ranking government officials for even just 15 minutes. The cruise was made possible by Secretary Billings '77, who I am looking forward to seeing this weekend at graduation as he was unable to make the yacht cruise around the Statues of Liberty last week. The trip was actually setup largely with his help, as USMMA sought to call the attention of the Secretary of the Air Force in charge of installations to our solar hydrogen house (USMMA is home to America's first entirely solar and hydrogen powered home). The idea was that the Air Force would be interested in the concept of sustainable energy as a money saving opportunity, and we were offering to develop closer ties with the USAF in exchange for personnel help from the Air Force. It was somewhat successful with follow up meetings between USMMA researchers, and the USAF.
Senator John McCain's advance man got here yesterday, and we so we are now tweaking and finalizing all aspects of the ceremony. As important as what I am doing is who I am meeting, and the contacts I am making are amazing. The last several mornings I have had breakfast with a nuclear propulsions expert. Since I have been here I have had a senior congressman's son tell me to let him know if I want his dad to help me out, a DIA (Defense Intelligence Agency) employee offer to introduce me to people and show me around the DIA when I go down to DC later this summer. It has been pretty amazing.
Thank you very much for your recommendation for this internship. I am doing my best to set a great impression to try and solidify the connection between UPS and USMMA, and I think it is entirely possible. I feel that I really got lucky with an internship where I get to heavily refine my career aspirations at the same time as gaining an incredible number of contacts within the Federal Government. Hopefully this email, along with the attached pictures will prove sufficient blog fodder for a day, although from the sounds of the archives you were recently in you may have found some good blog material. When I return we will have to sit down and talk because I have so many experiences and thoughts from this internship after just two weeks that it is unbelievable. In addition to providing me with housing the internship is also paying an extremely competitive wage ($12.50/hr), it really is about as good as it gets.
Regards,
Torey Holderith
