TCNJ

32 The College of New Jersey Magazine C harles Mazzucco was just a toddler on September 11, 2001, but the awful events of that day would leave an indelible impression on him, eventually influencing his decision to enroll in the Reserve Officers' Training Corps at TCNJ. As an ROTC cadet, Mazzucco attended a weekly five-hour lab on military logistical and procedural functions, and three times a week he began training workouts at 6 a.m. Last summer, with cadets from across the country, he took part in the ROTC's 38-day Advanced Camp in Fort Knox, Kentucky, sharpening his leadership skills and practicing myriad military maneuvers — marksmanship, navigation, grenade tossing, basic soldiering tasks — some days getting by on three hours' sleep. He loved it. "It could be difficult at times, but I thought our program prepared me very well," he says. "Our ROTC program gave me and my peers the ability to develop our leadership style and capabilities with constant supervision from senior Army officers and noncommissioned officers." When he graduates from TCNJ — magna cum laude — Mazzucco will enter the U.S. Army as a second lieutenant. But his Army career, like his last semester as an undergraduate, has been upset by the coronavirus outbreak. The knit cap he is wearing (above, left) is to keep him from being out of regulation with Army hair standards while barber shops were closed. A four-month officer leadership course, scheduled to begin on June 28, has been put on hold. Afterward, perhaps as early as November, he'll be posted in South Korea. In an email, he wrote, "I'm very excited." CHARLES MAZZUCCO, finance 2016 ROTC cadet 2020 Second lieutenant, U.S. Army JAIME ALLEN, nursing 2016 Aspiring midwife 2020 Behavioral health nurse The biggest change for Allen was that by the time she was a senior, "I didn't identify myself as strictly a student anymore." In addition to her studies she'd been a home-health aide for two private clients and shifted her passion from midwifery to mental health. "Mental health nursing requires a special relationship with each patient," she says. She starts at MedStar Washington Hospital, the D.C. area's largest regional hospital, in July.

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