Teen Graduates From Navy Cadet Program

Ben DeWitt didn’t have to think about it much when his parents suggested he join a Navy cadet training program.

“Yeah, it sounds like fun,” the 14-year-old Ventura resident said.

And it has been. Ben now plans a future in the Navy either with the Navy Seals or as a helicopter pilot.

Ben graduated from the airman program Saturday at Point Mugu Naval Air Station, where six young cadets have spent the past two weeks, eating, dressing and acting like sailors. Four of the cadets are from Simi Valley, another lives in Thousand Oaks.

During training, Ben’s day consisted of exercises, fixing airplane engines and learning how to wave airplanes in on a runway.

To participate in the program, the young cadets first went through two weeks of boot camp, not dissimilar from what enlisted sailors endure. There, the cadets were jarred out of bed every morning by a drill instructor’s shouts.

“In boot camp, we got yelled at all the time,” said Jon Olson of Simi Valley. “It is not as bad here.”

But moving up in programs doesn’t mean moving away from discipline.

“We try to instill in them that there are a lot of things they can do in the Navy that are fun and enjoyable,” said Samuel Salcedo, a sailor who volunteers to work in the program for the young cadets. “But most importantly, they learn discipline.”

On their last day of the program, the cadets performed a preflight check on one of the Navy’s HP3 Orion jets, before hopping in the plane for a flight.