Ground Zero Tour: 
The West Point Civil and Military Engineering club toured the ongoing construction site at Ground Zero in Manhattan, going inside both One World Trade Center (Freedom Tower) and the new state-of-the-art transportation hub known as “The Oculus”. The highlight of the trip for Cadets and faculty in attendance was the exclusive access to the Freedom Tower’s observation deck, located 102 floors above Ground Zero. Cadets were able to learn from the amazing synchronization of labor, construction management techniques, steel and concrete use, and overall engineering and architectural brilliance that is encompassed on the site to memorialize the lives lost on 11 September 2001. At the culmination of the tour, Cadets were given an opportunity to write their names on the wall of the observation deck, a very memorable experience for all.
“Ethics of War” Conference: Fourteen cadets attended the first annual Ethics of War Conference jointly sponsored by Villanova University and USMA at Villanova University. The undergraduate conference focused on contemporary issues in just war theory and the ethics of war. Eleven cadets participated in the conference by presenting panel papers with students from Villanova. The conference offered a unique experience by bringing together a diverse audience from the military with prominent experts from across academic disciplines interested in the ethics of war. Commenting on the conference’s benefits, Cadet First Class Billy White, an Art, Philosophy, and Literature major, said the panels “reminded [him] how important ethical questions are to being an officer in the United States Army.” He claimed that the “value of face-to-face access with the foremost leaders on the ethics of killing” was his “most valuable interaction with academia while at the Academy.”
11th annual Persian Parade: 
Seven LZ204 Basic Persian II Cadets visited NYC to watch the 11th annual Persian Parade marking the start of spring, which is celebrated in many Central Asian countries including the main Persian speaking ones: Tajikistan, Afghanistan, and Iran.
Iraqi émigré Fiction Author Hassan Blasim: The Department of English and Philosophy in conjunction with the Department of Foreign Languages co-hosted a reading by Iraqi émigré fiction author Hassan Blasim. Blasim read from his collection of short stories The Corpse Exhibition and Other Stories of Iraq (2014) and answered questions about his experiences as an artist in Iraq and after his emigration to Finland in 2004. The Corpse Exhibition features macabre, surreal, humorous, and sad stories about daily life in Iraq during the Iran-Iraq War, the Gulf War, under Saddam Hussein’s oppressive regime, and after Hussein’s removal by American and coalition forces in 2003.
National Undergraduate Literature Conference: Cadet Greg Davis '17 delivered a paper at the National Undergraduate Literature Conference at Weber State University in Ogden, UT. This undergraduate literature conference is in its 29th year, and Cadet Davis is the 1st USMA cadet ever to participate in it. Cadet Davis's paper "How to Tell a True Western" used Tim O'Brien's famous short story "How to Tell a True War Story" to explore how Cormac McCarthy's novel "No Country for Old Men" challenges the genre of the "Western Novel."
USMA Ethics Debate Team: The USMA Ethics Debate Team took second place at the first-annual Military Ethics Case Competition held at Annapolis. Hosted by the USNA Stockdale Center for Ethical Leadership, the competition featured teams from USNA, USMMA, UVA, and George Washington University. Five teams presented prepared arguments on the topic of battlefield mercy killing directed toward enemy soldiers. The competition was judged by faculty members of the Stockdale Center and other local professionals, many with extensive military experience.