As senior Trevor Rogers was taxied onto the Montgomery Field runway, he took a deep breath.

“Montgomery Tower, Cirrus six-three-zero-sierra-foxtrot holding short two-eight right for an eastbound departure,” he said into his radio.

“Six-three-zero-sierra-foxtrot clear for eastbound departure two-eight right,” the tower crackled back.

And with that short exchange, Trevor was granted permission to fly the Cirrus SR-20. He leaned forward, closed his preflight checklist, and pulled onto the strip. As he began to pick up speed to prepare for takeoff, his face tensed slightly in anticipation. “When you’re taking off, it’s like, ‘Well, there’s no turning back now,’” Trevor said. “For the most part, once you’re going [on the runway], you have to get airborne. You can’t just stop and turn around.” Turning back isn’t something that Trevor would do though, not after all of his hard work. For him, earning his private pilot’s license last July was just one step in his ultimate dream of becoming a fighter pilot in the Air Force. “I’ve wanted to be in the military since I was little,” he said. “But when I was little, flying [didn’t seem like] a reality. When I actually went to the [Air Force Academy’s] summer seminar though, it became a reality.”

For a reality though, it was one that didn’t come easy. While earning his license, he had his grades to keep up and flight school, which dominated a large chunk of his time. And, since Trevor hopes to earn for a spot in the Air Force’s highly competitive Undergraduate Pilot Training (UPT) program after college, both his high school and college GPA need to be near perfect.

“It’s going to be really stressful,” he said. “I’m not going to be able to have as much fun necessarily because I’ll have a lot of work to do. It will be all worth it in the end because I’ll have a guaranteed job in the military serving my country.”

Trevor is stepping up to the challenge though. Ending the year with his GPA above a 4.0, his license gained, and even an $18,000 AFROTC scholarship, all that is left for Trevor is to keep moving forward and to keep doing what he loves—flying.