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    Campo explains his trials to cadets, overcoming obstacles

    WEST POINT, NY, UNITED STATES

    09.12.2016

    Story by Michelle Matos 

    United States Military Academy at West Point

    In 1976, West Point endured one of the largest cheating scandals in collegiate history. One hundred and 52 cadets were expelled from the Academy after it was discovered that they were sharing answers on a small electrical engineering exam. The news spread quickly to national publications and broadcast outlets, and while the test only counted for about 1 percent of their final grade, the cadets involved were ultimately kicked out of the Academy.

    One of those cadets was Jose Campo, a corps squad wrestler and lacrosse player, the brother of a grad, and the son of a hall-of-fame wrestling coach. Forty years later, Campo returned to West Point to share his story with the Class of 2017.

    “It’s one thing to attend West Point, it’s another to graduate,” Campo told the crowd of Cows. “I know it’s hard but if you can get through this tough time in your life, you’re going to get the rewards for the rest of your life.”

    Campo revealed his own history, born of a kind mother and a father with high expectations. Growing up on Long Island, Campo saw his father turn their town into an athletic powerhouse.

    “I had so many of my dad’s wrestlers tell me that my father was the greatest, most influential person in their life,” he recalled. “I said to myself, wouldn’t that be cool if someday someone could say that about me? So I knew just as a little boy, all I wanted to do was be a coach like my dad.”

    One day, Campo’s father received a visit from an old wrestler he used to coach, a recent West Point graduate. The grad told his father that he couldn’t have done it without him.

    “I saw these tears of pride coming down my dad’s face, I’d never seen that before and I said to myself, I’m going to work hard for the rest of my life to try to get my dad proud of me,” Campo reminisced.

    So from that point forward, Campo did whatever it took to impress his father. Unfortunately, he began to go too far.

    “When I got to high school, I realized that everyone was catching up to me and some of them were even better than me,” he said. “So instead of me following all my dad’s great champions, I learned about shortcuts.”

    Campo shared deep secrets of his bulimia and taking laxatives to make weight for wrestling. While he never won any championships for wrestling, Campo was still able to attend West Point and score a spot on the wrestling team.

    “I thought maybe if I went to West Point, my dad would be proud of me,” Campo suggested.

    However, after a series of injuries and surgeries, doctors told Campo he would no longer be able to compete in athletics. Because of this misfortune, Campo began making poor choices, drinking warm beer in the woods and smoking weed. Eventually he got himself into deeper trouble.

    “Instead of me studying hard and graduating from West Point, I learned that there were ways that I could get the answers on the tests from other people,” Campo said. “So in 1976, I was taking electrical engineering, and in fact our whole class had the same plan. We were given a 10 page take-home quiz worth about 1 percent of our final grade… Third and fourth regiment had to have their quizzes in the night before, so I’d go over to third (regiment) and get the answers from one of my friends.

    “Little did I know that one of the cadets wrote on the bottom of his test, saying I received help on this quiz,” Campo continued. “You see, that set off an investigation in electrical engineering and I was involved in the largest cheating scandal in the history of West Point.”

    Campo said that calling his father and telling him he got kicked out of West Point for cheating was the toughest phone call he’d ever had to make. Instead of going home to Long Island, Campo fled to San Diego, unfortunately continually making poor choices.

    Finally, after nine years, things changed.

    “I stopped smoking weed, stopped cursing, started changing my lifestyle choices, and bam! Everything good started happening,” Campo noted. Campo became a wrestling coach at a high school in San Diego, he got his teaching degree for Physical Education and met his wife.

    “I stand in front of you today to tell you I got everything I ever wanted,” Campo said. “I want you to know that you are going to make mistakes, but your mistakes aren’t going to define you, I had this goal, this dream to become a coach, to help people, to help kids and that’s why I wanted to come here today—so you can learn from my mistakes.”

    Campo currently serves as a wrestling coach at Mt. Carmel High School in San Diego and has since been inducted into the Wrestling Hall of Fame, just like his father. In fact, he and his father are the only father-son duo to ever be inducted in the hall of fame.

    “When I got my award I walked straight to my dad and handed him the plaque, and finally, at 51 years old, I saw those tears that I waited my whole life from my dad,” Campo recalled.

    He explained to the crowd that while he is successful now, he’s had to experience hardships he wouldn’t wish upon them. He hopes the cadets learn from his mistakes and listen to his advice.

    “You’re going to be rewarded with the dreams of your heart if you do two things,” Campo concluded. “If you work really hard and you make good lifestyle choices.”

    After his presentation, Campo received a standing ovation from the audience.

    Honor Captain Amanda Blanco believed that the brief offered a unique perspective for cadets to consider.

    “I think that people can be cynical about the honor system, and also as something that is far away from them,” Blanco noted. “Sometimes people don’t understand the importance of it and how it can truly affect your life. It’s not just about you and lying and cheating on a paper, it’s about how you want to live your life, how you want to be as an officer, your family life. So I think it’s amazing to have someone like that to give them the opportunity to see that.”

    Campo hopes he offered that outlook as well.

    “My goal was just to go around and tell everyone about my story and to think about the consequences that I went through and didn’t want for anyone else,” Campo said. “It’s my hope that maybe one or two of these kids would listen to my story and hopefully make the change, because, like I said, attending West Point and graduating at two different things.”

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    NEWS INFO

    Date Taken: 09.12.2016
    Date Posted: 02.03.2017 11:22
    Story ID: 222431
    Location: WEST POINT, NY, US
    Hometown: LONG ISLAND, NY, US

    Web Views: 71
    Downloads: 0

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