RHS junior has career path mapped

While a lot of kids are wondering what they are going to do tomorrow, Tatiana Olivares has spent several of her young years planning her career.

She hopes one day to enter the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, and then join the Navy.

Toward that end she is doing everything she can to enhance her chance of receiving an appointment to the U.S. Naval Academy 2023 freshman class, she said.

In June, she attended her third Naval Academy Summer STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) program. This year’s competitive entrance program was done virtually as was the one she was accepted to last year.

But two years ago she got to attend the summer camp on the Naval Academy campus at Annapolis, Maryland.

“It was crazy. I burst into tears, I was so happy to be there. I was like wow,” she said of her first visit to the campus.

In addition to acquainting herself with the rigors of STEM study and the admission requirements of the Naval Academy, she is also gathering as many letters of recommendation as she possibly can to go along with her admission application.

She will apply for an appointment to the academy in January.

But for the coming school year she intends to maintain her high academic standards.

“This fall I will be attending the The Texas Bioscience Institute Middle College program that offers motivated high school students like me the opportunity to earn up to 60 college credit hours in a STEM–focused foundational curriculum which enhance my opportunity to get into the Naval Academy,” she said. “Becky Ingram, my high school counselor, helped me get accepted into the program.”

She will also be leading cheers during football season, and playing soccer and running cross country. Next summer she hopes to be accepted into the academy’s Summer Seminar, she said.

She hopes to go to the academy to continue her family tradition.

She has an aunt, an uncle and two cousins who have military backgrounds.

“Our family tree is done in military style,” she said.

“My family has always been my number one support team,” she said. “My parents have been very supportive of me and motivated me to do the best I can.”

And she is psyched to move ahead with her dream.

“I am so ready to finally start a new chapter in my life,” she said.