West Point's annual pillow fight...wait what? West Point has an annual pillow fight?

[Red Flag 1]

I've spent a few nights at Naval facilities, and USMA is not the only place were pillow fights erupt. It happened a floor below us, but there was plenty going on for few minutes. The section got slammed pretty good by the watch officers. The guy that took most of the heat was the unlucky sailor on fire watch. He got nailed for not stopping it, as if he had a prayer of doing so, and for not reporting it at the time. My guess, is that nothing would have ever been said if we, a USAF IG Team there to RON, had not been there.

 

[ThunderHorse]

Sounds like someone really, really, really wanted to go to West Point...

Um, no. If anything I wish I went to SDSU so I could have partied, surfed and banged chicks...couldn't really do those things at either place. And the only thing West Point has over VMI is the stupid amount of resources they waste.

The we accept only ten percent of our applicant pop is innacurate, selective still, but more like 20% of serious applications. VMI admits close to 40% now, but it is also in a smaller niche than an academy. I have many great West Point mentors, but not many good peers. And uh, letting off steam is not what you do at this point, but if you want to do that, ok, do what thou will.

But seriously, a pillow fight to build esprit de corps...didn't you guys used to do it the old way like via wholesale breakdown?

 

[policemedic]

Um, no. If anything I wish I went to SDSU so I could have partied, surfed and banged chicks...couldn't really do those things at either place. And the only thing West Point has over VMI is the stupid amount of resources they waste.

The we accept only ten percent of our applicant pop is innacurate, selective still, but more like 20% of serious applications. VMI admits close to 40% now, but it is also in a smaller niche than an academy. I have many great West Point mentors, but not many good peers. And uh, letting off steam is not what you do at this point, but if you want to do that, ok, do what thou will.

But seriously, a pillow fight to build esprit de corps...didn't you guys used to do it the old way like via wholesale breakdown?

Well, you're a graduate of a school ranked 82nd in the nation for liberal arts colleges, so you're a bit biased. You're also wrong. For the record, I'll state the obvious. My undergraduate degrees came from neither VMI nor USMA, so I have no skin in this game other than being a proponent of accurate statements.

With that said...

West Point is superior to VMI in virtually every quantifiable measure save one. According to US News VMI has about a $100 million more in its endowment fund than USMA does. But then, USMA's funding stream is a bit different so the practical effect of that endowment imbalance is probably nil. However, in the areas that matter--things like graduation rate, class size, national ranking--USMA is head and shoulders above VMI from an objective point of view.

Your statement that the 10% acceptance rate at USMA is inaccurate is wrong, at least according to virtually every credible source that tracks these numbers. Assuming arguendo that your 20% number is right then that still means USMA is more than twice as selective as VMI. That very likely contributes to the fact that USMA's graduation rate is some 30% higher than VMI.

West Point does have that pesky football problem though....

 

[Teufel]

VMI, the Citadel, Norwich, West Point and the other service academies are all good schools. You can't measure intangibles and I don't really care where US News ranks military schools. Good officers have come from all the aforementioned universities and that should suffice. I'm a Naval Academy graduate but I can recognize the strong culture, pride and quality inherent in all the military schools.

 

[Red Flag 1]

VMI, the Citadel, Norwich, West Point and the other service academies are all good schools. You can't measure intangibles and I don't really care where US News ranks military schools. Good officers have come from all the aforementioned universities and that should suffice. I'm a Naval Academy graduate but I can recognize the strong culture, pride and quality inherent in all the military schools.

Concur. Lets call a halt to Academy bashing.

 

[The Accountant]

This makes me recall a story I was told while I was on a student-athlete recruiting trip at West Point (about a decade ago now). Supposedly a handful of years prior to my trip there was a professor that after a flight somehwere, subsequently lost all of the written papers he was to grade for his class. His solution was to make up grades for each student to receive for the paper since he couldn't actually read them. I believe he was removed from the faculty.

With all these stories aside. I still wish I could go back in time to convince 15 year old me to have made the decision to attend West Point or any other of the aforementioned schools.