Author Spotlight
Avery Anderson
The kitchen was silent. Four people huddled around the phone, collectively holding their breath, waiting to hear what the speaker on the other end was about to say.
“I wanted to be the first to congratulate you on your acceptance into West Point.”
The voice on the phone faded into the background as the family cheered in excitement and group-hugged their future West Point Military Academy student, senior Jack Kessler.
Ever since he first found out about the esteemed U.S. military academy West Point in sixth grade, Kessler has been piling on leadership roles, meeting with past graduates and attending military-style summer camps in the hopes of being accepted into the historic college.
“This has been his dream since seventh or eighth grade,” his sister, sophomore Fina Kessler said. “I had a good feeling he was getting in so when he got in I was just kind of relieved.”
The rich history of the college, dating back to the American Revolution, as well as influence of veteran family members, contributed to his desire to attend the school.
“One of my grandfathers served in Vietnam and my great-grandpa, who I was actually able to have a pretty close relationship with, and who I’m named after served in WWII,” Kessler said. “I got to spend a lot of time with him and he was a pretty big influence.”
When applications for the class of 2028 opened last year, Kessler immediately pulled out his list of extracurriculars and military camps — building an application stacked with leadership roles such as Student Body President and useful experiences such as being a SHARE chair.
Kessler then scheduled interviews with several Kansas Representatives and political figures who would potentially nominate him to be admitted — a required step for all applicants. But after countless interviews with little to no follow-up, he began to second guess his chances of getting in.
After a year of applications with no letters of encouragement or assurance from West Point and no idea where he stood as a candidate, he was forced to consider his alternatives. Applying to other schools like the University of Kansas thankfully proved to be an unnecessary precaution.
“I would say it was around September that it occurred to me that I should probably apply to other colleges, which was hard since I’ve wanted to go to West Point since I was in seventh grade,” Kessler said. “It was hard for me to even think about other colleges, and writing essays to go to other colleges felt pointless.”
However, his attitude towards his potential acceptance would soon change.
“By early December I found out I got principal nominations from both Kansas Senator Jerry Moran and Kansas Representative Sharice Davids,” Kessler said. “So that made me feel a lot better because that’s a very good sign that you’ll probably get accepted.”
But in order to get into his dream school, he had to prepare himself for the notoriously grueling and extremely selective application process.
He began preparations around seventh grade, getting in touch with former graduates, people in the military and current students. Through in-person meetings and a constant stream of advice from mentors, Kessler began to piece together an idea of the program and just how much work it required.
In the summer before eighth grade, Kessler attended the Mexico Missouri Military Academy to get a feel for military life and talk to current members of the military. For the next few weeks, he followed a strict schedule along with other military-bound high schoolers. Since then he’s attended multiple other military camps in preparation.
He attended Boys State where he stayed with peers who had been nominated for the program who all worked to form a mock society with a government, jobs, laws and businesses. There, he was able to work with professionals who guided him through the replica government.
Long-term friends of Kessler have witnessed his dedication and seen the work he’s been putting in for years. Kessler’s childhood friend, senior Emma Krause, believes the camps he attended aided in his application.
“Over the summer he went to a bunch of military camps and he stayed there for maybe a month,” Krause said. “He was really good in those camps and he got awards.”
Now that he has been accepted, he can start preparing himself for the lifestyle change. He now wakes up at 4 a.m. for his morning run every day and plans to spend the next few months preparing his body, mind and family for his departure to West Point’s freshman boot camp this summer.
Though his major will remain undecided until sophomore year, he’s leaning towards an international relations major due to his interest in the topic. He plans to finish his required five years of military service before deciding between a different career path or continuing with the military.
Kessler looks forward to the rigid structure of daily life of West Point with strict wake-up times, daily military training and required uniforms that his connections with students currently at the school have clued him in on.
His goal is to show up in fall as prepared as possible to ease the transition.
Despite these sometimes brutal adaptations and the months of stress the application process brought him, both Kessler and his family are eager for Kessler to fulfill his childhood dream of attending West Point.
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