Admissions Stats Updates

Late last year, and again in January, we requested additional information from the USMA admissions office. This was to update the site with admissions information for classes of 2021-23, and to understand graduation outcomes for the classes of ’19 and ’20. We went to the FOIA office email address used before, and then another address … Read more

Mailbag: Are we doing this right?

Recently we got a comment on our post on the most Black women ever to graduate USMA: Thank you for sharing your analysis. From one academic to another, I would recommend that you add a section discussing the strengths and weaknesses of your research method and design. There are a couple of weaknesses with your … Read more

Class Year Data

The previous posts have been most edifying to put together, but we’ve been a bit short on time lately to build on them. There is additional analysis that can be done on activities (in particular, deeper dives into test and GPA by corps squad teams, analyzing the extent of test score advantages for various groups, … Read more

On Academic Standards

LTC Heffington claimed that Academic standards are also nonexistent. I believe this trend started approximately ten years ago, and it has continued to get worse. West Point has stated standards for academic expectations and performance, but they are ignored. He notes that: [emphasis added] West Point has stated standards for academic expectations and performance, but they are ignored. Cadets … Read more

Corps Squad Athletes and Test Scores

Reminder: LTC Heffington’s letter  and  LTG Caslen’s letters LTC Heffington made a specific, and fortunately for us, easily and empirically test-able claim that: Every fall, the Superintendent addresses the staff and faculty and lies. He repeatedly states that “We are going to have winning sports teams without compromising our standards,” and everyone in Robinson Auditorium knows … Read more

STAP Claim

LTC Heffington claimed, as in the first post of this series, that STAP (Summer Term Academic Program) is also now an accepted summer detail assignment, so retaking a course during the summer translates into even more summer leave for the deficient cadet. This (“also now an accepted…”) implies that it has become commonplace where before … Read more

About the Data

A few words about the data: We mentioned having the anonymized class profiles for the classes of 2000-2020. We obtained these through proper request channels to the US Military Academy, and received the files in Excel, one file per class, for each of classes 2000-2020.  The files had no explanation for an number of codes, … Read more

Why We’re Here

In late 2017, LTC (USA, Ret) Robert Heffington, a former professor at the United States Military Academy, wrote an open letter to the Academy community. In it, and stating his loyalty to the ideals of West Point, he proceeded to air a number of grievances against what he perceived the Academy has become, (and partially … Read more