Unit Facts: Cary High School has 1981 students. Our unit serves cadets enrolled from 9th through 12th grades. The unit has a current enrollment of 138 cadets with 16 seniors, 24 juniors, 35 sophomores and 63 freshmen. We emphasize a balanced program, striving for maximum cadet involvement in NJROTC and school activities that offer a wide range of opportunities for participation. Our goal is always individual growth in character and leadership. More than 80% of the cadets in the unit participate in NJROTC extracurricular activities. We are proud that we maintain highly competitive teams, while simultaneously volunteering many service hours that support the needs of our school, community and unit.
Unit fundraising is coordinated through an active and highly supportive NJROTC Booster’s Club. Through its efforts the unit is able to offer financial assistance to needy students who would not otherwise afford some activities such as field trips and summer training camps. The money raised by the Booster's Club also allows us to provide scholarships for our seniors. The past four years the Booster’s Club has given out over $14,000 in college scholarships and over $ 8,000 in NJROTC activity scholarships. To raise these funds cadets work many hours each year on unit fundraisers, such as NC State University football game concessions and a concert. Also this year the cadet staff created local business discount coupon books after soliciting merchant support to generate funds to support fellow cadets. Hand assembled by the cadets the coupon books raised $5,300.
Annually the unit sponsors a major drill and field meet, the Cary Classic, now in its 11th year. Due to the success of fundraising this year cadets decided to donate some of the proceeds to the Brian Keeter Foundation ($450), a local charity, and to the Toys for Tots Program ($750). Other examples of community service and shows of support for our military include: mentoring students at middle schools; helping at the Salvation Army; collecting Toys for Tots; sending Christmas cards to service members overseas; and major volunteer efforts at Raleigh-Durham Airport in disaster preparedness training, and in the Ride for Kids Program, a community-wide fundraiser that supports pediatric brain tumor/injury research.
Cadets make it a priority to support our local veteran’s groups and National Guard units arriving home from combat deployments though color guards, honor guards, drill performances and support of the local Golden Corral Veteran’s Day Dinner. This month the unit is involved in supporting “Back Home Boxes”, a local organization which sends care packages to the troops overseas. Very soon our school will host a Fine Arts Gala around a patriotic theme in support of our military that includes the school band, chorus, orchestra, dance groups and exhibitions of the visual arts, all supported by the NJROTC Color Guard and Shore Patrol. All proceeds from the event will go toward tangible support of military service members.
Last Veteran’s Day cadets in the unit initiated and organized a Cary High salute to all veterans in a solemn ceremony at the school that included an honor guard and guest speakers. At the invitation of cadet leaders, U.S. Representative Brad Miller, North Carolina State Representative Jennifer Weiss, and representatives from local veterans’ groups spoke at the event. Cadets also produced a well-received video for the ceremony that featured pictures and narration of Cary teachers and/or close relatives of teachers who served in the armed forces. Please find enclosed a copy of this video. This year’s cadet staff also initiated a “Wall of Hero’s” in the main NJROTC passageway that features pictures of Cary graduates in their dress uniforms who have gone on to serve in the armed forces. The "wall" currently has pictures and/or names of 110 former cadets.
Academic / Citizenship Achievements: The unit monitors and places continued emphasis on cadet academic achievement and routinely follows the academic progress of cadets in all classes as well as encouraging students to take honors and AP level classes, the SAT Prep and the SAT. This unit has measured success in helping our cadets to stay in high school and graduate. Through the Booster's Club the unit has been able to provide some routine daily financial help to a few highly needy student-cadets. This year two top students have been accepted to North Carolina State University’s School of Engineering, and they will be attending on Navy ROTC scholarships. Also this year one of our cadets has been named a National Merit Scholar and will attend the University of Georgia on a ROTC scholarship. This past year, for the third year in a row, we have had at least one cadet receive the North Carolina Teaching Fellows' Scholarship. This past summer we had three students selected to attend summer seminars for the service academies, two at the USNA, and one at the USAFA.
In the NJROTC National Academic Competition, for the second year in a row, four Cary teams finished in the top 30 % in our Area, a unique accomplishment. In the College Options Academic Competition Cary's team of two juniors and two sophomores finished third in the nation. The unit is proactive in motivating cadets to take both the SAT and the Navy-offered Peterson SAT Prep Course; thirty-four of this year's forty juniors and seniors have completed the program. Fifteen percent of cadets are members of the National Honor Society, and 28% were on the first semester honor roll with a 3.5 GPA or above. We currently have two cadets in the top ten academically of the senior class. In the past five years Cary NJROTC has had the top total scholarship award-winning student in the senior class, which record is likely to be continue this year with Cadet Beth Tabor’s scholarship offers topping over a half million dollars.
We strive to keep our program highly visible in the community throughout the year. This year we have performed over sixty public color guards for school, social, civic and veteran’s groups. We have marched in five local parades including the Cary Homecoming Parade, the Cary and Holly Springs Christmas Parades, the Cary Band Day Parade and the Raleigh Veteran’s Day Parade. We have provided color guards for the North Carolina High School Athletic Association state championships in football, basketball, swimming and wrestling. We also regularly input articles about the unit to the Cary newspaper. We schedule visits to our feeder middle schools so we are visible with them in support of our recruiting goals. The unit was invited in February this year to take part in a 30-minute local TV program called Full Circle, which can be viewed on the website at wcpss.net (TV-shows). Recently, at the invitation of the school system, Cadets addressed a School Board meeting about Navy JROTC at Cary High School to provide members an overview to the benefits of JROTC.
At the most recent Area Leadership Academy Cary was asked to provide the head cadre, as a result of her #1 finish at LA the previous summer, as well as a second cadre. In the past two years we have had seven cadets finish in the top 15 at Leadership Academy, with three being invited back the following summer to fill cadre billets.
Competitions: Cary seeks to field highly competitive teams in all activities. This year we won the drill meet in our area with the largest field at the Cape Fear Drill Meet that featured 19 teams. The drill team also placed first at the Pisgah Basic Leadership Camp Drill Meet, and we also had a second place finish out of 14 schools at the Smithfield Selma Drill and Field Meet. In other field meets we finished first in the Iron Man Competition at Clayton NJROTC for the third year in a row. During the year the unit won Academic Competitions at Cape Fear, SE Guilford, Myrtle Beach, and our aforementioned College Options Academic Bowl team placed third in the nation. At the Myrtle Beach Academic Meet Cary’s teams took the top three spots. On the National Academic test Cary’s four teams finished in the top 30% of the Area, with our top team finishing at the 98th percentile out of more than 1500 teams in the nation. The Marksmanship Team had another successful year, coming in first at the Area Six SE Regional Rifle match and finishing seventh in the Area in the SECNAV Postal. The Marksmanship Team competed in 12 shoulder-to-shoulder matches in North and South Carolina. Cary qualified for the Area marksmanship, drill, field and academic championship meets, but regrettably they were canceled due to severe weather. The unit received complementary letters from many individuals and organizations, including our local congresswoman, the Cary Town Mayor and the State Athletic Association.
Naval Orientation and Mentoring Activities: Over the past several years we have made trips to bases and stations of the Navy and Marine Corps. Trips have included a Blue Angels’ air show at MCAS Cherry Point, and a family day cruise/air show aboard USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN 69). We’ve conducted orientation trips to the Norfolk Naval Base, the Little Creek Amphibious Base, MCAS Cherry Point, MCAS New River, and mini boot camps at Pisgah Basic Leadership Training (BLT) at Camp Daniel Boone, NC, and at USMC Recruit Training Depot, Parris Island, SC.
One of our most important and successful programs has been our mentoring at middle schools. We have on going middle school mentoring programs and have formed NJROTC clubs with teachers as sponsors in three of our feeder schools Reedy Creek, West Cary and Salem Middle Schools. In these programs we have cadets visit schools throughout the school year to work with club members. The NJROTC Clubs are sponsored by teachers at these middle schools and Cary NJROTC cadets help them be successful with speakers and materials. The middle school clubs have helped attract many quality cadets to our program through increased awareness of benefits of JROTC. We complement the clubs with videos of unit competitions, community service activities and performances by our Drill Team at key times throughout the school year prior.
Community, School and Unit Service Projects: This unit prides itself on our many service activities for the community and school. We have accumulated over 1600 community service hours each of the past twelve years, and well over 1000 hours of school service. This year we documented over 2884 hours of community and school service credit for the End of Year Report. We focus on the many ongoing needs of our communitywith emphasis on veteran’s groups, Toys for Tots, the Salvation Army, Duke Children’s Hospital, mentoring at middle schools, assisting at local elementary school carnivals, over 60 requested color guards from the school and community, major parades, and most importantly, tangible support for our troops overseas. Seeing the need for more environmentally orientated community service, the cadets adopted a local road as part of the National Adopt-A-Highway Program. For the 11th consecutive year, the unit has hosted an all-Navy JROTC Drill and Field Meet. We also sponsor the Cary Classic Academic postal, the Cary Classic Marksmanship postal and the Cary Classic Physical Fitness postal. We coordinate and participate in numerous events for the school. This year, for example, the cadets were asked by our principal to do something special for Veteran’s Day. The result was the previously mentioned Veteran’s Day tribute video and ceremony, and our “Wall of Heroes.” Cadets also arranged to have a national flag flown over our national capitol presented to the school by Congressman Miller and a state flag flown over our state capitol presented by a Representative Weiss.
Recruiting and Retention Program: We have found that NJROTC cadet participation at school-sponsored events such as open houses, Meet the Teacher Night, Curriculum Nights and athletic events is the best tool in attracting new recruits to the unit. We also support and maintain NJROTC Clubs at our primary feeder middle schools. We host an annual “High School Orientation” assembly for rising 9th graders at these schools. Cary cadets from the drill, marksmanship and academic teams, and those from other areas of the program conduct the assembly. We host an annual New Cadet Orientation Week for rising 9th graders enrolled in the program prior to the beginning of school in August to help students transition to the program. As a result of personalized letters and phone calls to incoming freshman we had the largest turnout ever last August. Importantly, to retain high achieving students in the program, three of our upper level NJROTC courses are approved by our school system for honors credit.
Co-Curricular Activities and Individual Cadet Accomplishments: Our unit’s greatest source of pride is our individual cadets’ accomplishments; they are outstanding citizens of our school and community who participate in many activities and bring much visibility to our program through their successes. Cadet Beth Tabor was awarded an AFROTC Scholarship that she will take at the University of Georgia. Cadet Tabor is one of only 2,500 students in the nation to be named a National Merit Scholar and has accumulated over $ 500K in total scholarship offers for this school year to date. Cadets Grace Earley and Taylor Bye were each awarded NROTC scholarships to NC State University. Cadet Brendon Burns is competing for an AROTC scholarship to Campbell
University. We also have three cadets going directly into the Armed Forces with two enlisted in the Marines and one in the Air Force for this year. We have eleven cadets who are members of the Cary H.S. State Runner-Up wrestling team. Two of our NJROTC wrestlers, Justin LeRoux and Roger Terry, finished in the top five in the state. We also have some very successful runners: Jenna Christensen is one of the top runners in the state for cross country and is a member of the indoor state champion 4X800 relay team. Cadet Chloe Campbell was the Conference 200-Meter champion In total we have seven cadets on the cross-country teams, three on the women’s lacrosse team, thirteen on the football team, six on the swim / dive team as well as cadet participants in most every sport offered by the school. We also have cadets in the band, chorus and in the school plays. We have several senior who are team captains including cross-country, wrestling, track and lacrosse. One of our top seniors, ranking 10th in the senior class, has been in band all four years. We have many cadets in Boy and Girl Scouts as well with annual recipients of Boy Scout Eagle or Girl Scout Gold awards. We also have multiple cadets who are club officers and members of the schools Ambassador’s Club.
Annual Military Inspection: This year theunit had an on-site inspection and was rated as an Overall Outstanding by the Area 6 Manager, Commander Griffith Jones USN (Ret.), who commented: “Year in and year out, this program produces students destined to be successful after high school. No unit epitomizes a model program better.” He also said that: “Cary instills the values of citizenship, service to the United States, personal responsibility and a sense of accomplishment in their cadets. This Unit delivers on all the promises a superior NJROTC Program offers, and much more.”
Unit Goals Accomplished: Each year our cadets set specific goals which they typically accomplish. However, most important to our cadets is the continued focus on achieving more than has been done in each of the past years, gaining continued improvement and passing on a legacy of success, accomplishment and honor to those cadets who will follow in their foot steps. The unit strives to prepare good citizens, and good citizen leaders who are prepared to do their part for the school, community, and nation. Last year we had three cadets enlist in the USMC and one in the Army Reserves; one cadet received an NROTC scholarship to Duke University, three others also received NROTC scholarships, and one received a Teaching Fellows Scholarship to NC State University, and one an AFROTC scholarship to NCSU. This year the unit accomplished all of our goals. We are pleased but not satisfied by the cadet corps’ overall improvement in passing the Navy Physical Readiness Test, and we are pleased with the success of sales of our cadet made coupon book and improvements made to our website, which can be viewed at chsnjrotc.org.
Unit Philosophy and Vision: Our goal continues to be high levels of community and school service, and service to our local veterans groups and active duty service members. We will continue to have year-long practices for our teams so that we can field the most competitive teams possible and we will endeavor to find opportunities for all cadets to participate in the program, using all resources available to the maximum extent possible. We will do our best to develop cadets of good character, allow them to practice and sharpen their leadership skills in a controlled environment, and encourage all cadets to develop goals for lifelong physical fitness and leadership skills for success in their chosen professions. According to Commander Jones, “If the true measure of an NJROTC program is to train young men and women to succeed in life, contribute to the community, lead others, make sound and fair decisions, and instill confidence in their subordinates, there is no finer unit than the Cary NJROTC.”
