Jacob Hunter Wood, ,an 8th grader at Marlton Middle School, wins full scholarship to a military boarding school(Photo: Provided)
MEDFORD - Jacob Hunter Wood has known what he wanted to do with his life from the time he was 10.
He longed to go to a military school and then on to West Point.
Jacob, or "Jake" as his friends and family call him, began to research historic Fork Union Military Academy in Virginia on the Internet because family friend Steven Shelton had been a student there and eventually went on to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point in New York.
Jake, now 14 and an eighth-grader at Marlton Middle School, applied to Fork Union last year. Not only was he accepted for the fall semester, but he is the only incoming freshman selected for a full, four-year academic scholarship covering tuition, room and board, books and uniforms from ninth to 12th grades.
Tuition, room and board at the academy costs $30,000 a year, which makes his academic scholarship worth more than $120,000.
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"I feel honored I got the scholarship, and I cannot wait to go down and start my school year there," said Jake, a straight-A student who plays football with the Medford Renegades and loves backpacking in the Appalachians with his family.
At schooI, he is part of a peer mediation group.
The would-be soldier is interested in the military because family members including his dad and uncle are veterans. His father, Jonathan, a Cherry Hill firefighter, served in the Army. One of his uncles was a World War II veteran who was in the Normandy Invasion in France in June 1944.
"Seeing what they have done, I hope to do the same when I grow up," he added.
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His father and his mother, Colleen, a medical equipment supplier, are full of pride that their son was accepted at the academy and won the school's Board of Trustees Scholarship.
"He has been striving for this the past few years and came to us when he was 10 and said this is where he wants to go," his father said. "He wants to go to West Point because he has a strong desire to serve and protect people."
Todd Michael Giszack, the Fork Union vice president for academics who met Jake when he visited the school for a scholarship interview in February, said Jake was articulate and possessed poise and self-assurance.
"We consider him the best of the best and are excited he will be joining our ranks," Giszack said.
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He said the academy received dozens of applications in recent months from high-quality candidates all around the nation for the coveted scholarship.
"The school uses the best aspects of the military system to teach young men responsibility, self-discipline, leadership, respect for themselves and others, and the value of setting and achieving high standards," said Dan Thompson, academy director of communications.
In central Virginia between Richmond and Charlottesville, the academy boasts a 100 percent college acceptance rate and has an enrollment of nearly 500 boys in grades 7-12 with a one-year postgraduate program.
Established in 1898, the school sent three seniors to West Point last year.
Carol Comegno: (856) 486-2473; ccomegno@gannettnj.com
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Source: Big scholarship for Medford student
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