Smithson Valley will be hosting the first drill meet of the season Oct. 1, where 15 schools will compete to get to State. 

The official meet starts at 9:00 a.m. and ends at 4:30 p.m. While the Ranger NJROTC will not be participating in the competitions, they will begin to prepare for the meet at 6:30 a.m. 

Phases of the Meet

The meets usually begin with personal inspection. Personal Inspection includes the JROTC lined up in formation in the parking lot, where military volunteers will be walking through each row inspecting each cadet individually on their bearing and uniform tidiness.

This event  leads into academics, in which students will be tested on their general knowledge over anything related to history, war, science, politics, military information and more.  

Afterwards is unarmed basic and exhibition, followed by armed basic and exhibition. Unarmed basic is when the teams go marching in an orderly sequence, using their hands and feet to make a rhythm. Armed basics is when the teams march in an orderly sequence with their rifles in hand. 

Then, junior varsity and varsity color guard perform drill card movements with flags and false rifles. 

Physical training includes four females and four males per school. The teams will be judged on athletic abilities including cadence curl ups, pushups and situps. JROTC students will also participate in a 100-meter dash.

After JROTC students will be involved in Orienteering and Marksmanship. Orienteering is when JROTC students in a group of five will be handed a compass to take with them into the wooded area behind the school. Their target will be pointers, which are markers set up throughout the woods. The students will be expected to find the pointers with their knowledge of direction along with the compass they are provided with. 

Marksmanship includes the shooting team. The cadets will be expected to shoot air rifles at targets in three different positions: standing up, crouching and laying on their stomach.  

Once each team is done, the deck leads receive the scores from the judges and review them. A runner then takes the scores up to the JROTC room, where the designated people take another look at the score paper. They email the final scores to the school’s JROTC.

Once the last school finishes up, the cadets pack up their tents and other supplies left out. The next meet will be at Flour Bluff High School in Corpus Christi on Oct. 29.