MEMORANDUM FOR RECORD
SUBJECT: STATEMENT FROM CADET LEADERSHIP ON THE MEANING AND FUTURE OF THE
VIRGINIA MILITARY INSTITUTE
We write neither in anger nor in defiance, but in duty. We represent the Virginia Military Institute Corps of Cadets as leaders entrusted with responsibility for the Corps’ discipline, morale, and welfare. We live daily under the system now under review. Because of this, it is our duty and Honor to discuss what Vะะ is, how it operates, and who it serves.
Public discussion of VMI has grown increasingly abstract. Reports and testimony now speak about the Institute, while those voices being cultivated within it remain largely unheard. This letter exists as the voice of those being forged by the system under review. What follows is not an institutional defense, but a moral account: testimony from cadet leaders who have embraced the system.
All who pass through VMI endure the same system of discipline, instruction, and hardship. That shared experience creates bonds, but it also creates obligations. Chief among these is the obligation to speak truthfully; testimony about institutional culture should reflect both context and criticism.
When failures are cited, has progress also been documented? When problems are named, are solutions being pursued also mentioned? Partial truths, however factually correct, create fundamental misimpressions about our institution.
We do not deny imperfection; we deny invisibility. Since 2020, VMI’s reforms have been real and lived. Where our experience ends, we rely on the testimony of those who have come before us. Improvement is ongoing, not achieved by dismantlement.
