Sandy "Sandman" Berger's Page

I am sure your speaking of the not so secret Sugar Grove, WV. We had hoped our son ould have gotten the chance to go there, but he is a CTN and there are few if any slots there. We have a home about 2 hours drive west of there in Queens, WV. Sugar Grove is south east of Elkins. If you "Google" it you will find a few sites that cover/review it. It's in beauttiful country, right by a national forest. If you blink going through the town though you will miss it. There really isn't much to the town itself, so the base is pretty much self contained, if you want to go anywhere to have some "fun" you have to drive quite aways..

That's great, Sandy. I'm sure she was eager to get started. That's interesting about the special study times. It makes perfect sense, but I never thought about the fact that they wouldn't be able to take their homework "home" with them. I'll have to tell Karen about that the next time we talk. (We've been using Skype to do a video call about once a week.) Karen's classes start on the 14th, so not much longer to wait. There will be a total of about 30 A2Es taking classes together this fall. She won't transfer to Correy Station until after the holidays.

Hi Sandy - Karen is doing fine so far in Pensacola. I really can't remember her being happier since she was in grade school. She's really glad she made the decision to join the Navy. I've asked her a couple of times if she's met a fellow CTR name Berger and so far, not. They seem to have grouped about two dozen Accelerate to Excellence participants together in the same building down there, for whatever reason. Most are not CTRs, though, it's a variety of ratings. (They call themselves A2E's.) Karen starts classes on 9/17, but I don't think it's her actual 'A' School yet. I think that starts in January next year. She said they're keeping them really busy in the mean time. We did a video chat with her one night a couple of weeks ago and she was exhausted, and it was only 8 pm! The A2E program is fairly new and not well known, and we're sort of learning about it as she goes along. When she's finished with A school, she'll have her associates degree, which is what drew her to A2E. If I remember right, Molly had already completed 2 years of college when she joined. If so, she may classing up for A school ahead of Karen. I'll remind her to keep a lookout for Molly, though.

That is a great idea. My son as well will be going to Pensacola. Did your sailor get time over the weekend to spend with the family before shipping off?

Just wanted to say howdy you have a real cool home page and welcome home.

Rex

HOOAH !!

Oh, and you were right. She was very emotional after BS. That was on the 30th, which was her 19th birthday. She became a sailor on her birthday! A better present than I could ever give her.

Sandy - Karen called last night to say she leaves for Pensacola early tomorrow morning. We were hoping for another call tonight, but haven't received it. I posted some pictures on my page from the weekend. We have a family picture we took on the wall there at the train station, very similar to yours. PIR was awesome, and the whole weekend was just great. We did get to have lunch with my dad at one of the famous pizza places in Chicago on Sunday. Karen's best friend from BC was alone because her family had already left for home, so she went along which was great. We got to hear double the BC stories, and it was nice to learn how much the sailors in their division looked after one another. Karen is really pumped about starting A school. I hope she doesn't have to wait so long for classes to start that she loses her enthusiasm. I've watched some of the posts on the Pensacola A School group, so I'm aware that there may be long delays. We haven't heard anything more on security clearance, so I guess that's still to come. Anyway, Karen should arrive down there tomorrow morning sometime. Once she calls with address info I'll let you know.

Hi Sandy. Yes, we're heading up tomorrow as soon as I get home from work. We'll probably leave here at around 5:30 or 6. Karen has passed everything now except her Battle Stations, which starts in about 20 minutes. We'll probably get our call while we're on our way up to GL. Karen is absolutely thrilled at this point - she's just loving the Navy. It's thrilling for me to read her letters and know she's so happy. I think she's happier right now than she's ever been. It's just great! I just got off the phone with my dad giving him an update on her progress. I'm trying to work it out so that he can meet us for lunch on Saturday or Sunday in Chicago. He lives in NW Indiana, near my sister- and brother-in-law. They're going to drive up one day for lunch with us, and I'm hoping he can hitch a ride with them. He's 90 years old and a WWII vet (bomber mechanic in the South Pacific). He exchanged letters with Karen during BC a couple of times and is really proud of her. I know he would get a big kick out of seeing her in uniform.

We still haven't heard anything more as far as Karen's background check or interviews with neighbors or anything. Have you?