Just recently Bartlett’s JROTC, participated in an activity called “Wacko”, in which Bartlett took 1st place in many of the events. This was basically just a competition with the 5 other JROTC programs throughout the Anchorage district. This competition was held on Saturday November 1st, at East High.

For those of you who may not be entirely familiar with what this event is mainly focusing on, is to develop camaraderie between JROTC programs, and cadets while competing in some rather informal/fun events. This will give the cadets an opportunity to meet as many other cadets from other schools as possible.

These are some of the evens they participated in. The first event was called “the obstacle course”, in which 5 males and 5 females stand on opposite ends of the gym, then each contestant must negotiate each obstacle instructed. After each contestant has completed his or hers turn, they have to sit on the floor and remain seated until the rest of their team has completed the course. The course consists of crawling under tables, jumping over hurdles, bat twirl and balloon sit (twirling around 5 times with the bat on your forehead, then try to pop a balloon by sitting on it), egg on spoon hurdle walk, doing a foreward roll on the mat, and hula hooping. Males start at the opposite end of the gym and do the obstacles in reverse order as the females, who start at the other end of the gym.

Event number 2 was “the M&M treasure hunt”. In this event, 10 M&M’s will be in a pie tin full of whipped cream. The contestant must find all 10 M&M’s before the other teams do, using only their mouths.

Event 3 was called “the sleeping bag relay”. The whole point of this event is to take off all of your clothes (wearing a swimsuit under your clothes) and then putting your clothes back on. You must do this inside of the sleeping bag, which is completely zipped up the whole time.

While interviewing some of the cadets and commanders, we get a better understanding of what they thought about this event. Cadet Commander Sgnt. Major Lopez, and Cadet Captain Callister say “they like Wacko because it builds comaraderie, it builds a bond between the cadets in our JROTC> People think that JROTC is really strict, but we do all sorts of fun stuff, because JROTC is great.” While speaking with Cadet Diaz, she tells us, “I thought that wacko was fun, and I would participate in this event again next year.” Cadet Foe agreed with Cadet Diaz, and said, “I liked this Decathlon because of the activities I took part in, I would also like to participate in this Decathlon next year.”

As you can tell, Bartlett’s JROTC had a great time participating in “Wacko.” Not to mention they had a great time, and did very well at it. Congratulations JROTC, on accomplishing great success! keep up the good work!