Special Projects Officer ROTC: Colin Cummings

Houston, Texas

Major: Biology

Pre-Medical

Reserve Officers’ Training Corps:

Cadet Wing Executive Officer

Senior

Class of 2021

Q. Here is Colin Cummings a Biochemistry major, who at the time of this interview serves as a Cadet Wing Executive Officer for the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps. Can you tell me about yourself?

A. I am a junior Biochemistry major here at Baylor University. I am a POC within the Air Force Reserve Officer Training Core here at Baylor. I come from Houston, Texas. I have done a lot of things. I am also a pre-health student, hoping to go to med school, currently studying for the MCAT.

Q. Thank you, so you mentioned you were in ROTC, could you elaborate on what ROTC means and what it stands for?

A. Of course. ROTC itself stands for the Reserve Officer Training Core, and so specifically the mission of the Air Force Reserve Officer Training Core is to develop leaders of character for tomorrow’s Air Force. So, as a freshman, I came in and basically started learning all about Air Force history and heritage, the kinds of customs and courtesies that go along with becoming an officer.

So, in the first two years, you learn a lot about what it is like to be an airman in general. So, right after high school, we have the opportunity of enlisting, if you want to, but choosing to go to college and go through ROTC is the gateway to becoming an officer. So, right now in ROTC, I am currently the executive officer of our detachment at Baylor. Our mission is to both prepare freshmen who are just coming in to help them get acclimated with college and with it is like to be an ROTC student and Baylor student at the same time. With the sophomores we are preparing them to be sent off to Maxwell Air force base in Alabama, to go through their field training. As soon as they finish their field training, they will come back and they will be in my position, which is the training area. They will be responsible for freshman and sophomore cadets themselves.

Q. As a freshman coming into Baylor, you already seem to have had an idea that you are going to be a part of ROTC. Can you describe what it was like to get your feet wet within the program?

A. Here is just a little background on why I chose Baylor. I originally applied to Baylor, the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, and University of Texas. The University of Texas, as a state school, did not have as many scholarship opportunities as I hoped for, and I was really going for the Air Force Academy. Just because I had decided in high school that I wanted to serve for at least four years, that was my original plan. I just knew that was something that I wanted to get my feet wet in, not necessarily just because I wanted to become a leader but because I wanted a structured path, just for as far as career and life goes. As a freshman, coming into ROTC at Baylor, I was somewhat surprised. My expectations were that it was going to be challenging of course, but I didn’t necessarily think about all the challenges that would be associated with just being a student at Baylor, in general, but I came in with a mindset that I was going to work my hardest and I knew that if I did well that the Air Force and the ROTC in general, will give me an opportunity to stay in college.

I had my sights set on a few specific scholarship opportunities, specifically within the ROTC. One of those opportunities was called the Type 1 Commander scholarship. As a freshman, I decided that was going to be my aim within ROTC, not just as a pre-health, pre-med student, but I also knew that was kind of what I was shooting for, as far as ROTC was concerned. Deciding a major for pre-med was not too difficult because biochemistry was what the advisors at Baylor recommended because it covers a lot of the pre-health premed classes itself and it was also considered a technical major for the Air Force. The only difference in technical and non-technical majors for the Air Force is there's different kinds of scholarships associated. Some of the technical majors are usually the ones that get bigger scholarships not necessarily because they are more challenging but because it is what suits the needs of the Air Force.

As a freshman taking freshman biology, chemistry and I even took Japanese too. That was my foreign language. It was definitely a challenge and I instantly realized that doing both pre-med and ROTC, was something that was going to take a lot of focus and a lot of grit so I did notice right off the bat that I was in a situation a lot different than my peers and it took a lot of self-control to not go and have as much fun. I hate to say it as some of the other freshmen coming into college for the first time. All of our first experiences in college so I knew I had to be just very focused but from my first experiences of waking up at 5:30 in the morning on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays to be at physical training, which in itself was not easy. It definitely got me used to just the intense training environment and what it is like to be in the Air Force in general.

I definitely had a lot of people around me in hard classes that would, not necessarily be as positive and would complain about how hard life was or how much sleep they didn't get the night before and I do remember thinking “oh man if only you knew what it was like to have to wake up this early,” but over time it just kind of became what my life is about and it was less about “I wish that it was that easy for me,” and more of “this is how it is and it's my life and I'm going to make the most out of it,” that kind of thing and then from freshman year actually I achieved my goal of getting a scholarship by second semester freshman year. So after doing well academically things worked out and I joined a few pre-health organizations, specifically BURST, Baylor undergraduate research because personally I was really interested in research and in general and just kind of figuring out what that was all about. So, I think that answers that question.

Q. Throughout your three years, but for a student who is in ROTC, from the jump. What will those four years look like? Starting from freshman year leading up to graduation

A. That is a good question. As a freshman, you come in and your main goal is to be an information sponge of sorts so a lot of people aren't expected to have experience with the military, they're not expected to know like rank structure or the chain of command and basically we're just preparing you the same way that we treat basic Airman coming into the air force for the first time. For a freshman, your main goal is usually grades because if you cannot get good grades just as a freshman then you won't be able to stay in college usually if you fail and so that's kind of what we focus on. So for a freshman you are essentially getting mentored by upper-class ROTC Cadets who know what it can be like to take on those challenges and basically you take in as many of those points as you can figure out what kind of study habits work well for you and that's what freshman year looks like.

Sophomore year is a little different because you have learned everything that you should know, as far as Air Force core values are concerned. Warrior knowledge is something that is big which is basically key points of information such as chain of command, all of the Air Force commanders, and the different Air Force bases around the world. Different kinds of drill movements are all things that you learn freshmen year that you should be going into sophomore year ready to understand. With that, as a sophomore, you become a mentor to the freshmen. When you're mentoring the freshmen, you're getting the opportunity to teach others and have that information hardened in your mind so you can go to field training that summer. This is where you have the opportunity to be evaluated on your leadership skills. Sophomore year the main goal is to figure out what kind of leadership style you are just personally acclimated towards, so you try to figure out what works well for you naturally.

Whether that be like a mission oriented leadership style where you're constantly focused on the tasks that are given to you or whether you're more of a people oriented person where you focus on developing teams and just allaround encouraging people and getting people to do hard work for you. It really depends and there's a lot of different ways that people can lead but as a sophomore you try to figure that out so you can go to field training and use that and get evaluated to the best of your abilities. Then right after field training and you graduate, you immediately join the POC or the Professional Officer Course.

In that, you're learning more about what it's like to be an officer in the actual Air Force until you're learning about the responsibilities that come along with that being in the military and what kind of life changes you have to make and that also comes along with being in ROTC. They teach you to do things that you would be expected to do in active duty. For example, there are a lot of things around integrity, our core values are integrity first service before self excellence in all we do and so we very strictly teach Air Force Cadets and just people in ROTC in general that you got to have integrity in the things that you do outside of school. You cannot go and break the law have any kind of civil involved in since so, a lot of that comes down to just the way you live your life. It also comes down to being strong physically because you have got to be very focused on your body and taking care of yourself in order to get the mission complete.

It is our responsibility to give up a few things that most college students would be used to. We do that to get you on active duty. As an upperclassman you are learning about the real world and how to become an officer and your main job is to teach those same things to the underclassmen. You have to be a stud at that point because you have to know what's going on and you don't get sick days because everyone as a underclassman is looking up to you and if you waver then they will definitely pick up on that. Often times what will happen is based on the type of POC that you have, that will determine the cadets that end up accomplishing more in their time.

As a Senior, you have the highest leadership positions on the lines of organizational leadership. As a Junior, however, you are face to face with the underclassmen a lot and you have a lot of personal informal leadership. You got to know how each of those cadets is doing in their day-to-day activities, you have to make sure that they are doing okay in their classes or at least they're focusing their time (time measurements are a huge thing also). But as a senior, you're focusing more on ROTC as an organization making sure that all of the objectives for training are getting hit and making sure that all announcements are getting done while focusing on the whole, rather than just each individual cadet. It becomes more responsibility while you are very close to be being commissioned as a Lieutenant. The classes that you are taking are more specific towards what life will be like in active duty deciding what career path you are going to go down. ROTC Cadets get their AFSC (American Friends Service Committee) numbers or their Air Force specialty codes which designate which career field they go into as an officer. It can range from Logistics to Health. With Health, you can go to medical school or nursing school afterward. Other choices include Intelligence Officers, Security Forces, Special Forces, and many more. So as a senior you are really packing your bags and getting ready to move forward as your career takes shape, making things pretty intense.

Q. That is very, very interesting. So, for a person that is coming into Baylor, let us say they are looking to be pre-med, but they also want to do ROTC. When they apply, what are they looking to check off on the application box? Second question to go along with that, when they apply does ROTC assist them in paying for school as well? With financial aid of some kind?

A. That is also a good question, and my answer is that as far as the checklist goes there’s a lot of things, and so no one thing is usually better than the other, but a few important things for high schoolers I would recommend would be some sort of physical activity. For me personally in high school I played soccer and I was on the varsity team my Junior and Senior year so I got a lot of good teamwork experience from that and also physical experience because both of those play into ROTC but also you want to make sure that you're ready for an academic challenge because it will definitely be there no matter what major you go into you. You are going to be spending a lot of time studying and you are going to be spending a lot of time just at that in general. As far as financial aid goes the ROTC does have scholarships, so as a high schooler you can apply for the HSSP, the high school scholarship program, through Air Force ROTC specifically.

There are three other scholarships to each of the other branches in the military, specifically the Army I know for sure has a few scholarship opportunities for high schoolers but when you go to apply to that, you take a physical fitness test and they'll score you on that. And they'll basically determine how likely you are to do well in ROTC and so a lot of people don't know, they’ll base that off of your high school GPA your SAT, ACT scores so those are some things to focus on. They will probably ask you to do a few things such as writing essays. As students begin to gain medical checks, what may come up will include physical limitations either caused by childhood ailments or something else that ends up being something that could potentially limit you in the field of the military as an officer. They are looking for people that are both capable but also qualified to go into the Air Force because they are looking for fighters, they are looking for people that can do the job and they can do it well. So yes, as a high-schooler I would recommend focusing on a lot of those things.

Q. Once you are in college, because obviously you need a certain GPA, certain SAT, or ACT score to get into specific tiers of schools. But once you are in college, you are in ROTC, what is the minimum GPA required to stay within the program?

A. The minimum GPA to stay in the program I believe is a 2.0 and that information is all accessible on the Air Force ROTC website. In the Air Force ROTC the core values of, “Integrity first service before self” and “Excellence in all we do” along with another push cadets to try to exceed the standards. If a cadet is sitting at a 2.0 GPA, a lot of times the leadership in charge will kind of counsel that Cadet or that student in general and just ask, a) is this what you're cut out for, and b) are you up to these challenges.

We are trying to make sure we have the best people because we are looking out for those people's best interest. Because you do not want to go through college suffering and get to a job or career that you really do not want to do. That can happen a lot of times because when you're going shooting for certain career fields it is competitive and so the career fields in the Air Force that a lot if you want to go to, pilot for instance is competitive and if you don't have a specific GPA or if you really don't have a good score on the pilot tests associated with that then you are less likely to get that job. You might get put somewhere where you really don’t want to be. There is no specific GPA other than a 2.0 to stay in ROTC but it is good to continually shoot to exceed that standard. That is what we encourage our Cadets to do.

Q. As a member of ROTC, have you created interpersonal relationships with good people, close people that you know? And a sub-question to that is, do you know of people that have dropped ROTC because of the difficulty, or even had to even switch majors. If so, how often does that happen?

A. As a freshman I came in with a class of about forty Cadets in the Freshmen ROTC, now we are down to twelve Cadets. The weed-out process is a lot like what you would see in the pre-med weed out process at Baylor in that the numbers are lowered. But it's the same kind of weed out so we're like I don't know it's two thousand or so freshmen will come in with pre-med on their hand in applications but they will end up graduating Baylor and only about four hundred or so people actually continue down that route. It is near the same for ROTC just on a smaller scale. When I came in there probably about 10 pre-med people in ROTC and now there are only two of us. A lot of times, what I would see is people coming in from all different backgrounds. People leave and have to drop out for different reasons some people have financial difficulties where they are not getting their scholarships covered and then they are forced to leave. While also some people may have something happen within their families and their families might question if what they are doing is right. Then the individual themselves can also decide that they realize that they have other aspirations. So yes, changing majors does happen often. I know plenty of people who were in pre-health and ROTC at the same time and realize that both at the same time were too challenging for ROTC and so they would drop one or the other. I know one person who was pre-health, pre-med, and then just dropped that in general and decided to go ROTC all the way, which is a perfectly good option.

There are plenty of options and so there are also major changes within ROTC. You will have people that decide they want to go down a certain career field. Specifically, some people choose something along the lines of intelligence versus piloting or vice versa just because certain career fields will need different kinds of experiences.

I hear this a lot in Air Force. Let’s say you want to go into experimental research in the Air Force and the person who wants to do that might be an English major or they might be something more along the line of computer science. Baylor might not necessarily require them to take certain courses like Physics or Biophysical Chemistry. The Air Force will highly recommend stuff like that. But yes, there is indeed a weed-out process but in ROTC we are encouraged to look out for a wingman. Wingmanship is a huge deal to us and the specific Detachment Commander from two years ago stated that it is only worthwhile if you get through with people next to you.

There are a lot of different ways of looking at that but essentially can you focus on those around you and hold them accountable while trying to help them achieve their dreams because you should want to expect the same thing from them so they can help you do the things you want to do. That is the kind of the culture that goes along with Air Force ROTC at Baylor and I'm sure a lot of other detachments around the nation at different colleges. It is definitely a challenge and it's not for everyone but if you're the type of person who is looking for the opportunity to just give everything you got then I would highly recommend looking into it.

Final Regards: Colin Cummings

As a student officer, there are many hurdles that Colin must work through to be successful within his field. The requirements of just a general member of ROTC alone are grueling especially coupled with the life of a pre-med student. And as he states, there are few members of Baylor ROTC that are still pre-med, yet, he finds a way to be successful by fostering strong relationships with his peers and seeking out assistance and advice always. Colin also makes sure that he has time to work on his hobbies as he is also the world’s youngest Air Hockey world champion which was recorded in the Guinness Book of World Records in 2015.