texas a&m was it for me that is where i wanted to be and that was the ultimate goal these are the aspirational words of ennis rios ‘19 the 2018-19 deputy corps commander of the texas a&m corps of cadets and a geographic information sciences and technology (gist) senior in the department of geography in the college of geosciences while the path that led rios to texas a&m was not always an easy one he has persevered in the face of adversity and will graduate this month although he did not know it at the time his road to texas a&m started when rios dropped out of high school i didnt really know what my cap on success would be rios said looking back i had set the bar for myself fairly low uncertain of where his life was headed rios decided to join the united states navy rios joined the navy as a radioman in 1999 and spent 15 years working in a range of fields from network security management to naval special warfare his last position in naval special warfare landed him in stuttgart germany where he met his future wife ambyr a 2008 aggie graduate i didnt know anything about texas a&m or texas in general so when i saw her aggie ring i asked her about it he said after that first introduction to aggieland rios set his sights on texas a&m when it came time to transition out of the military i knew i wanted to go to college and i had my hopes set on texas a&m overcoming adversity as a non-traditional student after completing his time in the navy rios faced significant challenges in applying to texas a&m i dropped out of high school i had no sat scores and i had no college credits from my time in the military he said i wanted to go to a&m but i did not have the credentials twenty-seven days after leaving the military rios started at del mar community college in corpus christi with the help of the texas a&m veteran resource and support center (vrsc) rios was able to focus his energy on the courses that would help him transfer into a program he would be interested in a year and a half out there was no guarantee that i was going to continue school or make it to a&m but the vrsc was persistent in its support of my goal to get here someday eventually after taking all the classes that he could transfer rios decided it was time to apply to texas a&m my wife and i decided that next semester it was not worth using my veterans benefits to take classes that wouldnt transfer so it was time to start submitting applications with texas a&m at the top of his list rios submitted the application to texas a&m first in almost no time rios hard work had paid off the steady march through community college after more than a decade without school had led to this moment before i had the chance to start on the applications to other schools i received my acceptance to a&m rios started at texas a&m in the spring of 2017 veteran support at texas a&m made all the difference rios experience as a radioman and an information systems technician in the navy led him to major in gist the major provided him with the opportunity to combine the skills he learned in the military with a field that he is now passionate about i love this stuff rios said i can be a part of producing quality products that others can use