Senior Nia Townsend joins her first year in “The Rosette” Newspaper for an opportunity to do something fun for her last year of high school. She is currently involved in Emerging Leaders, Science National Honor Society, and also the Battalion Commander of JROTC. When she isn’t practicing marching or juggling honors, AP, and Dual credit classes, you can find her reading, making bracelets, and baking sweets. Her favorite thing to bake is chocolate chip cookies because they are the superior sweet (just kidding). In her quiet time she enjoys binge watching episodes of Grey’s Anatomy. This year she hopes to make the most out of newspaper and find a home within the staff.
Attention Cadets! : Townsend explains how she grew to love JROTC.
Reported by Aniah Ross
Senior Nia Townsend has been in JROTC since her freshman year. Her dad encouraged her to sign up even though that was not her original plan.
“While my dad and I were at Transition Night he saw the JROTC table in the distance,” Townsend said. “Since my dad was in the military he told me that I should try it out. He walked over to the table and I sort of just didn’t walk away, so I ended up signing up.”
Townsend shares that she had plans of being a dancer way before ROTC or the military crossed her mind.
“I had thoughts of being a Sweetheart,” Townsend said. “If I wasn’t doing JROTC I would honestly want to be a Sweetheart. Just seeing them on field performing just makes me feel excited, I also love their uniforms, they are so cute.”
After knowing her friends were signed up for JROTC, Townsend realized she wouldn’t be without people she didn’t know for her first year in high school.
“I wanted to have classes with my friends freshman year,” Townsend said. “Some of my friends had JROTC on their schedules, so I got excited to be able to take a class with them.”
Three years into the JROTC program she has learned more than just military basics, she learned life skills and life lessons.
“Starting high school I was as quiet as a mouse, very timid, and overall an inside of my shell type of girl,” Townsend said. “As the years go on I learned leadership skills, how to talk in front of a crowd with no problem and how to manage stress and anxiety. Being able to learn these principles helped me grow as a person.”
Mastering those leadership skills, Townsend earned the position of captain her junior year. Taking on that role came with its own set of challenges.
“I consider myself a perfectionist,” Townsend said. “I like making sure everything is exactly how it should be, and it doesn’t help that I have a little bit of OCD on top of that. Especially since I am in charge of the whole program it takes a lot of principle, organization, and focus to get stuff done.”
Over the past two years, the JROTC program gave Townsend an environment where she could become a leader. She successfully became the arm drill captain and created bonds with all of the JROTC members.
“The program is super fun and a safe space and a very family friendly environment,” Townsend said. “As I have just gone throughout the years, arm drill is my closest family. All the people in there I can talk to basically about anything, they are always there. Yeah we joke around and there might also be drama that happens which might suck, but at the end of the day we are all still here for each other.”
