Oklahoma outlook, winter 2012

              OKLAHOMA OUTLOOK
Winter 2012
You can read an extended version of our interview with John-Kyle at www.okffa.org.
How to serve your country and help pay for college
Throughout high school at Jenks, I was involved in the FFA. My
sophomore year, I was a chapter reporter. Then my junior year I was
chapter vice president and senior year I was chapter president. I
always competed in public speaking and parliamentary procedure.
Sophomore year, I went to nationals with the job interview career
development event. Junior year, our parliamentary procedure team
went to nationals. Senior year, I won the natural resource division in
speech and placed third in Ag policy. That was the same year I was
running for state office.
John-Kyle ran for state reporter. That became a turning point in
his life because, as much as he loved FFA, he was also very much
interested in the military. During his junior year he had applied for
nomination to the prestigious West Point Military Academy, which
he received a year later, at the same time he was running for State
Reporter.
I had my nomination to West Point and I had the opportunity to
run for state office, and I was doing both. The plan was, if I didn’t get
state office, I would accept my West Point nomination. If I did get
state office, I’d decline my West Point nomination and go to
Oklahoma State and do the state office. That’s what happened. I won
state reporter, so I declined my West Point nomination and went to
Oklahoma State.
John-Kyle could still have gone to West Point after one year at
OSU, but he decided to run for state president, which he did not
win, and by the time the state convention that
year was over, it was too late for the West
Point application process. However, he still
had a desire to do something with the military,
so he enlisted in the Army Reserves in 2008, his
sophomore year at Oklahoma State. During
the second semester of that year and the fol-lowing
summer, he did his basic training at
Fort Knox, Kentucky and advanced training, at
Fort Bragg, North Carolina.
I got back in July of that summer. So I
loaded up my hours and took 24 hours the next
semester. Did that and got caught back up.
Went ahead and graduated on time with my
class at Oklahoma State.
How did your decision to join the military
impact how you paid for college?
It took care of about half of my expenses at
Oklahoma State. The other half, I would work
while I was in school and also during the sum-mers;
I would work and supplement it with that.
In your case, joining the military and the
educational assistance you got from that really
didn’t make the difference between going to
school and not going to school. The difference it
John-Kyle Truitt is a former Oklahoma FFA State Officer. When
he was a sophomore at OSU, he enlisted in the Army Reserves. As a
result, he was able to defray about half of his total expenses for col-lege.
Here’s his story, beginning with his high school years:
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