Female cadet shares West Point experiences with Ooltewah High School students

photo West Point cadet and Ooltewah High School alumna Heather Purkey speaks to a Spanish II class Tuesday at Ooltewah High School about her experience as a West Point student of language. Purkey shared her travels overseas, including a semester spent in Spain with the students.

As a girl on the Ooltewah High School boys' wrestling team, Heather Purkey stood out. She returned Tuesday to the school as its first female cadet set to graduate from the U.S. Military Academy.

Purkey sat in her gray and black cadet uniform in front of a Spanish class of 24 students and answered questions about her time at West Point.

The 21-year-old cadet lieutenant graduated from Ooltewah High School in 2008. Since entering the military academy, she has traveled to Spain and France to study languages and to Puerto Rico for the school's judo team.

She told the Ooltewah students that effective prioritization is the most important skill at the academy. As a cadet she must do well in classes, participate in a sport and perform as a leader in her military job.

"Juggling all these things, a lot [of cadets] don't know how to prioritize," Purkey said.

Many high school overachievers reach the academy and have a difficult time the first year because they want to do everything perfectly, she said.

"You just run yourself into the ground," she said.

Realizing where she could put her energy helped her succeed, she told the class.

Neither Ooltewah freshmen Brady Crews, 14, nor Courtlyn Ison, 14, plans to go to a military academy, but each said after the class that Purkey's opportunities to travel interested them.

Courtlyn noted how the travel "surrounded" Purkey with the culture and language and "it helped her experience of it."

Courtlyn said she plans to do a study abroad in either French or Spanish after high school.

Crews said he had never heard of a female wrestler in high school and saw how that could be a challenge for Purkey.

For Purkey, the most intensive portion of her West Point education has been peer leadership -- mentoring, guiding and keeping other cadets accountable for military responsibilities and grades.

"They're also the people you're going to commission with, so you want to have a good relationship," she said. "The Army's a small place."

The first day retired U.S. Army Maj. Paul Dean met Purkey at Ooltewah High School, she told him she wanted to go to West Point.

"OK, we'll see," the Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps leader at Ooltewah told her.

But from that first day onward, Purkey did the exact right thing, he said.

"She got involved," Dean said.

Dean said he hoped that, through Purkey's visit, students learn "it's not a male world anymore, a young lady can go to the service academies ... be successful, be a leader."

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