HOOYAH!
Roared in SEAL training. HOOYAH! Roared when tridents were pinned on chests. HOOYAH! Roared as a battle cry. On the 6th of August, roars stopped for 17 SEALs.
August 6, 2011 – Gavin’s father was on a Chinook with his fellow teammates when his helicopter was shot down by enemy fire killing all 38 personnel aboard. Gavin’s father was a US Navy SEAL, a highly decorated leader, a dedicated father, and a loving husband. He left behind a clear message and requests for his family. Who will keep his promise? We will.
When Gavin’s mother expressed Gavin’s interest in software programming, WoHF was able to turn Gavin’s dream in to reality within 36 hours.
One of the most successful Milestone events to date took place this past May. WoHF partnered with Google to provide Gavin and his SEAL mentor two days of complete access to Google’s staff and resources.
The head of the training team at Google, a teacher and software engineer by profession, invited Gavin to work on a two month project focused on video games. Gavin responded immediately, “When can I start?”
Gavin participated in two live coding sessions with his mentor and the Google team. According to his SEAL mentor, “Gavin did amazing. Excellent and insightful questions, passionate and positive.” He received praise, support and the encouragement to continue learning. The Google team taught him “why techies are the cool kids in school.”
“Just for fun”, Gavin got to sit in with a flight engineer to report on balloon positions half a world away and got to test drive a self-driving car. By coincidence, one of the Google team members was a retired SEAL who had a very close buddy in common with Gavin’s Dad. Many thanks to the Google team for making Gavin part of the family.
Our hero, our friend, our teammate. HOOYAH to your promise kept.
