President Barack Obama will be in New London Wednesday to give the commencement address at the U.S. Coast Guard Academy. It’s the second time he's been the keynote speaker for graduation at the Academy. He was last here in 2011.
This may be a college campus, but for the 224 cadets about to graduate, the last four years have been no ordinary college experience. “Really, I mean they push us through the gauntlet here, it’s a challenge, for sure,” said Distinguished Honor Graduate Justin Sherman. “But the things we get out of it, the friendships we make, the places we get to see, the things we do have been amazing. It’s been incredible.”
Case in point: last summer, one of Sherman’s classmates, Marina Stevens, was aboard the Coast Guard Cutter Healy in Alaska, when the vessel got an unusual call.
"This guy had handmade his aluminum boat -- a 41-foot boat that he had welded together, and he decided he was going to sail it into the Arctic," said Stevens. "And he got stuck, and he was fending off polar bears for eight days. And we had to go get him."
The then-20-year-old ended up helping in a rare Arctic search and rescue mission.
Stevens is the fourth generation of her family to serve in the Coast Guard. "My mom had been in for 30 years. Her brother was in for 30 years. They both became captains," she said. "My great-grandfather was in the Lighthouse Service, and my grandfather was a boatswain's mate in the Coast Guard."
For Sherman, raised far from the sea in Ohio, the draw was the mission of the service. "Growing up, I was really passionate about environmental protection, and still am, and of course that's also one of the Coast Guard's missions," he said.
Their extraordinary college experience will have an extraordinary culmination Wednesday, as they welcome President Barack Obama to be their commencement speaker.
“It’s just exciting to be able to say, the President of the United States was at my graduation,” said Sherman.
Stevens said they were kept guessing almost until the end of the semester. "It’s incredible! I can’t even believe it, because I know a couple of weeks ago, they didn’t even know he was going to be able to come, and they had finally let us know, and our class was so excited," she said.
Presidents speaking at commencement at military academies rarely make big policy announcements, but Sherman and Stevens said they hope the president will speak to the Coast Guard’s expanding role in drug interdiction, immigration, environmental policy, and the Arctic.
As top of the class, Sherman too will get to speak, and he said his focus will be his classmates. "Commencement day is about the past four years, but more importantly about the future that comes ahead," he said. "The individuals in our class just blew me away, so I’m excited to see where the class is going to go."
