Excerpt from this monograph:

It is with some amusement that I reflect back on the first day of my new job, November 23, 1977. Sometime around 2:00 a.m. I found myself standing straight as a two-by-four in a pair of yellow footprints painted on the pavement. Several Marine sergeants were whirling around our newly arrived platoon like tornadoes, roaring orders and hurling invectives.

It’s humorous now after nearly 30 years, but at the time—as anyone who’s been there and done that can attest—it wasn’t funny.

The Corps set me on a path of believing that I could achieve anything I put my mind to. Eventually, I ended up serving seven years on active duty, all stateside and mostly in peacetime. I will always remain deeply gratified to be part of that “band of brothers”—a term of fraternity among Marines long before the superb special aired on HBO by the same name.

Many of the leadership and survival lessons I learned in the Marines proved applicable to civilian life. This was never more true than during my years as a school superintendent in independent schools. Such schools face similar challenges as charter schools, including having to compete for enrollment and teachers.