Before becoming a TFAS student, Sean served 4 years in the United States Marine Corps. Sean has a passion for encouraging other veterans to take the TFAS journey that he describes as “transformational.”
Read what Sean has to say about his experience at TFAS and how it has helped shape his post-military life.
After serving four years in the United States Marine Corps, and as a freshly transitioned veteran navigating the many challenges of college, I was inspired to connect my military experience to an intellectually curious and globally oriented community. While at the time I was unaware of the specifics and did not know exactly what professional field to pursue, I knew that I wanted to continue serving my country in one capacity or another. Hoping to contribute to a broader discourse, I acknowledged the need to go beyond the classroom and immerse myself among the nation’s thought leaders, expanding beyond the common silos of university life.
As a veteran student, TFAS provided an indispensable bridge from my undergraduate studies to a more perceptible environment, ultimately linking the theories of the classroom with everyday practice. The interactions with students from a variety of socio-political backgrounds and cultures while at TFAS helped widen my scholarly aperture, instilling a renewed sense of community. My experience at TFAS also helped prepare me for the career path that followed: working as a consultant for Deloitte, and now in my current position, working on security issues in the public sector.
My summer in DC with TFAS was a seminal moment in my life. It provided me with the training and intellectual motivation – not only to transition but also to advance. It’s sometimes the case that student vets are detached from university life as a function of differences in age, life experience, and values. The TFAS community embraced my background as an opportunity to support and better understand the gravity of military service, often inviting my insights on issues within current events, and valuing my leadership.
Most importantly, TFAS provided an ideal environment to think freely and critically, challenging preconceived notions, and elevating my perspective. I look back on my experience that summer at TFAS and am grateful for the foundational memories and debates, as well as the lifelong friendships that continue to reinforce my zeal for public service.
I honestly cannot think of a more perfect union than the one between TFAS and the veteran community. TFAS as an educational nonprofit strives to impact our world by developing leaders for a free society and does so by promoting principles of limited government, free markets, and honorable leadership. Veterans – whether marines, soldiers, airmen or sailors – in service to the country as both enlisted members and as part of our officer corps, traverse the farthest and most turbulent corners of our globe to defend and uphold our nation’s values of freedom and liberty. They do so with a devotion to core values, as evidenced by the Marine Corps’ very own, “Honor, Courage, and Commitment.” To put it more simply, veterans have demonstrated their investment with their own sweat and determination to the very same principles that TFAS holds tried and true.
My goal is to encourage other veterans to undertake the TFAS Journey – a journey I found to be transformational. I hope you will consider supporting the special Veterans Initiative that TFAS is launching to recruit, serve, and honor undergraduate students who have served in the U.S. armed forces. By providing scholarship funding for this initiative, you will be helping student veterans recognize and build on their unique skill sets; successfully transition from military life to civilian life; and become leaders who will “preserve, protect and defend our Constitution” as they pursue new paths of service to our country.
DEFEND YOUR VALUES TODAY!
This is just one of the thousands of examples of students and educators becoming an amplifying effect on the preservation of America’s founding principles here and abroad.
Sean Heravi is proof that it’s not too late. We can still turn the tide by proactively reaching and teaching the next generation with the bedrock principles that have made America a beacon of freedom in the world.
But we can’t do it alone. The mission of The Fund for American Studies is only as successful as the willingness of men and women like you to partner with us financially.
Here at The Fund for American Studies, we do not take any money from the government which is why donors like you are so important. At the end of the day, greater support means more students attending and experiencing TFAS, as well as increases our ability to help more American servicemen and women like Sean work to defend American values for generations to come.
There are more young people just like Sean who need your help. Will you do your part to preserve American values with your gift of support today?
Your gift of any amount today will help us continue to transform the lives of students like Sean Heravi, and others, who go on to transform the world with the message of individual liberty and economic freedom that they learn here.