It’s a Man’s World

Lexi Namer

UNC Chapel Hill

The Oak Ridge Military Academy (ORMA) is a co-ed military boarding school north of Greensboro, North Carolina. It is one of eight co-ed military academies in the country, and prides itself on the school's academic rigor, college preparation, and leadership opportunities for students, also known as cadets.

The girls at ORMA are there for a myriad of reasons ranging from parental force to the desire to attend a challenging college preperatory school. Regardless of how these girls arrived at ORMA, each has traded in a high school experience with dresses, movies, and parties for one filled with uniforms, rules, and structure. They have boyfriends, wear makeup, and gossip, but the formidable teenage years of officers, a prestigious rank earned by the school's top seniors, come with the responsibilities of commanding their peers and ensuring order.

Engulfed in the male-dominated world of the military, these girls, making up less than a quarter of the student body, or platoon, must figure out their places as cadets, leaders, and young women.