More women were inducted into the Naval Academy's Class of 2010 Wednesday than in any previous class in the school's 161-year history.
The 273 women also make up 22 percent of the 1,218 students who entered the academy, the highest percentage in school history and second among service academies only to the U.S. Coast Guard Academy, where women make up 28 percent of the student body.
"In 1980, we admitted about 80 and in 1990, we did 136, and [now] we will have some 270," Vice Adm. Rodney P. Rempt, the academy superintendent, said Tuesday. "That's huge progress."
The others who went through "induction day" - where incoming freshmen, or plebes, are brought in, shorn, given their uniforms and stripped of all ability to communicate with the outside world - made up a fairly typical class of midshipmen.
The 285 members of minority groups were 67 African-Americans, 131 Hispanics, 43 Asian-Americans, 25 American Indians, 10 Hawaiian or Pacific Islanders and nine who identified themselves as African-American and Hispanic.
The class also includes 12 international students from El Salvador, Ecuador, Korea, Taiwan, Lithuania, Romania, Pakistan, Algeria, Jamaica, Malaysia and Micronesia.
And for the first time, an Iraqi student was admitted at the U.S. Military Academy in West Point, N.Y., and the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colo. The Air Force Academy also admitted a student from Afghanistan.
Eighty-eight students are children of Naval Academy alumni, while 89 are former enlisted sailors, Marines or airmen. About 33 percent, or 397 students, come from college or post-high school preparatory programs, including 237 from the Naval Academy Preparatory School in Newport, R.I., 18 from the Nuclear Power School Program in Goose Creek, S.C., 61 from other preparatory schools affiliated with the Naval Academy Foundation and 81 students from other university or private prep schools.
The plebes generally bring solid academic credentials and a record of involvement in high school activities. Eighty percent were in the top fifth of their class, and more than two-thirds of the class scored between 600 and 700 on the verbal portion of the SATs. Almost 85 percent scored in that range on the math portion.
About 90 percent of the students had been varsity athletes in high school, and that same percentage had participated in drama, public speaking or debate.
