WMU Home > About WMU > WMU News

WMU News

WMU cadet wins ROTC's highest national honor

Oct. 27, 2006

KALAMAZOO--A Western Michigan University Army ROTC cadet is one of just four students nationwide to be awarded the Legion of Valor's Bronze Cross for Achievement, the highest award presented to a cadet.

Cadet Lt. Col. Andrew L. Bond, a senior majoring in political science from Hartland, Mich., was presented the award last month by former Army Sgt. Edward Funk, also a member of the Legion of Valor and a World War II veteran who received the Distinguished Service Cross for gallant service in Okinawa.

"The most amazing part of receiving this award was receiving this award from Sgt. Funk," Bond says in an article in the Western Herald. "I felt unworthy, in a way."

Bond entered the Army in 2000 and attended classes in Texas while on active duty. He left active duty in 2004 on a three-year scholarship to WMU, entering as a sophomore. Upon graduating, he will go back on active duty and hopes to branch off into military intelligence.

Bond definitely fills the scholar-athlete-leader requirements for the award, says retired Lt. Col. Brett E. Johnson, scholarship and enrollment officer for the military science department.

"Bond has a cumulative GPA of 4.0, is the Cadet Battalion Commander and consistently scores 290 out of 300 on his physical fitness test," Johnson says. "He is the poster boy for the scholar-athlete-leader. I see maturity and leadership ability in him that I'm accustomed to seeing in a captain with four to five years as an officer."

Media contact: Mark Schwerin, (269) 387-8400, mark.schwerin@wmich.edu

WMU News
Office of University Relations
Western Michigan University
1903 W Michigan Ave
Kalamazoo MI 49008-5433 USA
(269) 387-8400
www.wmich.edu/wmu/news