A way to escape turned into a sense of pride

Charles Van Tran, a supply chain management major, is vehicle mechanic with the Pennsylvania Army National Guard, spending his summer in ROTC cadet leadership training at Fort Knox, Kent.

“Originally, I joined the military to get away from everything, but I ended up enjoying it a lot more than I thought,” said Tran, who served two years as an enlisted soldier prior to enrolling in BU and joining ROTC. “It gave me a sense of pride and duty to protect my country. Along with that, it gave me a sense of acceptance that no matter how different we are we all have a common goal in the military, which is to succeed, and be the best version of us that we can be.”

Tran said he enjoyed the military lifestyle so much that it drove him to the ROTC program, which he plans to commission as a 2nd lieutenant so that he “may lead and inspire others as my mentors have inspired me.”

Even though a full time student, the military keeps him very busy.

“At home station drills I will train at the Kingston Armory in Wilkes-Barre with the 2803rd FSC, while at away drills, I train at Fort Indiantown Gap,” Tran says. “My annual training vastly varies from year to year. As an enlisted member I have been to Fort Pickett, VA and the national training center at Fort Irwin, CA in which the training exercise at the two sites were vastly different.”

According to Tran, the training that was conducted at Fort Pickett was to provide mechanical support to the 2nd 104th Cavalry, while the training at Fort Irwin was a pre-deployment training in which we pulled security, conducted more battle training exercises, while still supporting the 2nd 104th.

BU plays a big role in helping him succeed.

“I choose Bloomsburg University because of the great environment, education, and the fact they have a beautiful campus is a plus,” Tran says. “In addition to that I also choose it because it was known to be a very military friendly campus. I feel as if Bloomsburg University is a military friendly school, because they make it priority to help their military students balance out their school schedule along with their military schedule.”

Schools influence on his future in the military.

“My job in the military from when I was enlisted has nothing to do with my studies at the university, but the branch I’m hoping to receive once I commission would be Quartermaster, in which it closely resembles my current studies as a supply chain management major,” Tran says.