Decades ago, serving in the Reserve Officers Training Corps (ROTC) was mandatory for all Georgia Tech students and the ranks of the campus battalion routinely numbered in the thousands. Today, Tech’s ROTC programs provide advanced training for only an elite few, such as School of Economics alumnus Andrew Townsend (pictured left).

“I always wanted to be a Marine, ever since I was young,” said Andrew Townsend just a couple of weeks before commencement and within days of achieving his childhood goal. He has been commissioned as a second lieutenant in the U.S. Marine Corps and in the months following will face The Basic School (TBS, a six-month program that the Marine Corps uses to invest in the education, training and further evaluation of its newly commissioned officers.

“I didn’t even think I’d go to Georgia Tech,” the Tucker native continued. “But I knew Tech was a good school and had the Naval ROTC. That’s what I wanted to do.”

The plan seems surprisingly simple for a student who has surpassed every benchmark laid out for him since he started in 2010. Townsend secured one of the coveted four-year national ROTC scholarships that would eventually train him to be a junior officer.  During his tenure at Tech, Townsend also earned a slew of awards.

He was recognized as the Officer Candidates School Honor Graduate last summer; then he was named the Navy ROTC’s midshipman of the year by the United Services Automobile Association (USAA). Last fall, he served as battalion commander, helping train younger students preparing to attend Officer Candidates School. It’s the highest leadership a participant in the Marine Option Program can attain.

“If you want to be a true leader, you can’t worry about yourself. I look at Townsend and he gets through running a phenomenal run, almost Olympic athlete pace type-stuff,” Captain Joshua Roberts said. “And he gets done and he doesn’t go over and lick his own wounds, he doesn’t sit on the side of the field and stretch out. Immediately when he gets done, he looks around and goes back down the course to find more people to help them finish at a better time.”

Townsend is a bright representation of what Georgia Tech’s ROTC program looks like today. He is one of 18 students on track to commission as Marine Corps second lieutenants upon completion of their studies at Georgia Tech. Those 18 Marine options round out the 67 students participating in the Georgia Tech NROTC battalion, which includes students from Georgia State and Southern Polytechnic State. They make up just over half of the 124 students who are the Atlanta Region Consortium.

Read more about a day in the life of a Marine Corps Option.