How I Became a U.S. Foriegn Service Officer

In the summer of 1981, I was preparing to end a 20-year military career. Although I grew up in a small east Texas town (population 715), 20 years of globetrotting from one army base to another had me hooked on finding a new career that offered the same experiences. My problem was, I didn't have a clue what that career should be.

My last army assignment was as the senior training advisor for Slavic languages at the Defense Language Institute in Monterrey, California. As had been my practice during my time in uniform, I spend many of my free hours at the base library. The librarian was an extremely intelligent and engaging woman of French-Senegalese ancestry. I spent many hours listening to her fascinating stories about the places she'd lived, and we became very good friends.

When I shared with her my desire to find a new career that involved travel and exposure to different cultures, along with my inability to determine what that career should be, she suggested the U.S. Foreign Service. Often during my years of service, I'd met and even worked with Americans who worked in our embassies and consulates abroad. In 1981, though, the U.S. Department of State didn't do a very good job of recruiting; relying mainly on self-selection, and input from a few Ivy League colleges on the east and west coast. Never had any of the people I encountered talked about how they got their jobs.

From an old book in the library, we found the address of the Foreign Service Board of Examiners in Arlington, Virginia, and I wrote off a letter requesting to be registered for the Foreign Service Exam to be given that December. The letter back to me acknowledging my registration mentioned that in preparation for the exam, I should be up to date on current events. As I've always been a voracious reader, that didn't present any problem. The envelope also contained a booklet describing Foreign Service jobs, and a sample test; a simple multiple choice test not unlike the thousands of such tests I'd taken during my time in the Army.

On Saturday, December 5, 1981, there was heavy fog over Monterrey Peninsula, and having worked late that Friday, I overslept. I woke up to find that I had just over three hours to make the drive through heavy fog from Monterrey to San Jose, where the test was being administered. My wife advised against it, but never having a person to resist a challenge, I dressed quickly, skipped breakfast and hopped into my car. Driving, I must confess faster than the weather conditions warranted, I made it to the test center with about three minutes to spare. I took the test and then went home and forgot about it - figuring that I'd probably done well, but not good enough to be selected over the hundreds of other applicants at that center, let alone the 25,000 other applicants they told us were taking that year's exam.

To my surprise, I did pass, and was invited to take the oral assessment in San Francisco in April. Again, to my surprise, I passed and was invited to join Foreign Service Class 11 in August 1982. My retirement was slated for September, but the army allowed me take leave and join the class. A few days before we graduated from orientation training and took our oath of office as new Foreign Service Officers, I received an envelope from Monterrey with my army retirement papers. For about a month, I was both an active duty army officer and a Foreign Service Officer, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Reference: For information about U.S. Foreign Service careers, check out

http://www.careers.state.gov/