Photo By Aren Everett | 190523-N-MC656-0003 Wausau, Wisconsin (May 23, 2019) Navy Recruiter Hospital Corpsman...... read more read more
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Just Another Day
By Aren Everett
Navy Recruiting District Chicago Public Affairs
WAUSAU, Wis. – May 13, 2019, began like any other Monday. The weather report called for sunny to partly sunny skies, highs in the low to mid 60s and light winds. There was absolutely nothing to indicate that this day would be anything other than a normal Wisconsin day, and Kiara Schuster had absolutely no reason to believe otherwise.
The 22-year-old native of Stevens Point, Wisconsin, got up, showered, got ready for work and headed out to her office, just as she had every other day since November 2018.
Schuster joined the Navy Reserves a week after her 17th birthday.
“I joined as a reservist because my mom said she wouldn’t sign the paper for me unless I went into the reserves,” said Schuster.
Schuster accepted a job as a Navy Hospital Corpsman. She went to boot camp, completed her Navy “A” School training and went back home. After another year and a half of schooling, she began working as a phlebotomist at a plasma donation center.
“I’ve always kind of wanted to go into the medical field in general,” said Schuster. “I like it a lot. It’s fitting for me.”
One day, she received a call from her mentor asking her if she wanted to try recruiting.
“I was like, yeah, why not?” laughed Schuster. “So I called them up, did the phone interview, put my application in and it just happened.”
The station located in the area in which Schuster grew up was full, but that didn’t bother her.
“I’m from Stevens Point, but I live in Wausau,” Schuster said. “I played club volleyball in high school, so I knew people from all over the area anyway. It wasn’t terribly difficult to make connections up here.”
One of the connections Schuster made was with Colby High School in Colby, Wisconsin. On that Monday, she was scheduled to pay them a visit.
When Schuster arrived at her office in Navy Recruiting Station Wausau, she checked her email, packed her “school box” with surveys, pamphlets, pens, pencils and various items of Navy swag and then went right back out to make the familiar 45-minute drive out to Colby as she had many times before.
Arriving at the school, Schuster checked in with the office and the school counselor then headed to the cafeteria to start setting up her table exhibit before the first of two lunch periods began for the students of Colby High.
The first lunch period came and went. Schuster got a couple of students to fill out surveys and then chatted a few minutes with the counselor who stopped by in between periods to see how things were going. The counselor left and the second lunch period began.
Schuster remained at her display table and continued to scan the cafeteria for potential Future Sailors. Suddenly, she heard a student coughing. Not overly concerned, she glanced over at a table a few feet away from her and immediately noticed a problem.
“[A girl’s] face started turning super red and she stopped coughing,” Schuster recounted. “She turned to the [boy] sitting next to her and tapped him and pointed to her throat.”
“He was like, ‘Oh my God! She’s choking! I don’t know what to do!’” continued Schuster. “And I thought, ‘Alright, well, here we go.’”
Schuster approached the choking girl and did a quick assessment. Seeing that the girl was still choking, she performed the Heimlich maneuver. After four or five abdominal thrusts, the food dislodged from the girl’s throat and she began to breathe again.
Schuster remained with the girl to ensure the danger had passed and then went to inform the staff at the other end of the cafeteria what had just happened. The teachers left to check on the student and Schuster returned to her table.
Schuster acknowledged that under these circumstances, most people would probably react as the boy had and panicked. She attributed her reaction to the training she received from the Navy.
“I grew up knowing how to do CPR and stuff like that,” Schuster said, “but being a corpsman you get constant training. The military has taught me to keep my composure and to keep my focus on what’s going on and what I need to do.”
“It was an eventful five seconds,” Schuster went on. “I saw her, I saw her point, and then I was like, ‘Nope. You’re not dying on my watch. Not today.’”
It was a normal day in Wisconsin, until suddenly it wasn’t. Thanks to the quick and decisive actions of Navy Recruiter Hospital Corpsman Petty Officer Second Class Kiara Schuster, a student at Colby High School is able to experience many more days that are ordinary.
Navy Recruiting District Chicago is assigned 61,945 square miles across Northern Illinois, Northwest Indiana, Eastern Wisconsin and the Western Upper Peninsula of Michigan. It includes 46 recruiting stations divided into nine divisions charged with the mission to provide the Navy Fleet with the proper quantity and quality of Sailors to keep our Navy and our Nation strong.
Navy Recruiting Command consists of a command headquarters, three Navy Recruiting Regions, 18 Navy Recruiting Districts and eight Navy Talent Acquisition Groups that serve more than 1,300 recruiting stations across the world. Their combined goal is to attract the highest quality candidates to assure the ongoing success of America’s Navy.
For more news from NRD Chicago, visit https://www.navy.mil/local/nrdc/ or follow NRD Chicago on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/NRDChicago/).
For more news from Commander, Navy Recruiting Command, go to http://www.cnrc.navy.mil or follow Navy Recruiting on Facebook (www.facebook.com/NavyRecruiting), Twitter (@USNRecruiter) and Instagram (@USNRecruiter).
| Date Taken: | 05.28.2019 |
| Date Posted: | 05.28.2019 11:31 |
| Story ID: | 324131 |
| Location: | WAUSAU, WI, US |
| Hometown: | COLBY, WI, US |
| Hometown: | STEVENS POINT, WI, US |
| Web Views: | 284 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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