For the 14th consecutive semester, the Virginia Tech Corps of Cadets is bringing back corps graduates who have recently returned from a combat deployment to speak to the regiment.

The Fall 2010 Gunfighters Panel will be held on Thursday, Sept. 16, at 3:30 p.m. in Burruss Hall Auditorium. The panel will last about an hour. All are welcome to join the corps for this inspirational event. The Gunfighter Panel is consistently considered the best presentation by the cadets because it highlights what the corps experience does to prepare them for the challenges of the real world.

Each semester, alumni are welcomed back to campus to sit on the Gunfighter Panel, which is one of the four programs in the Leaders in Action lecture series hosted each term by the Virginia Tech Corps of Cadets’ Rice Center for Leader Development. The officers will share their combat deployment experiences, their lessons learned and leadership challenges, while also sharing how the corps of cadets experience prepared them for life after college.

The Gunfighter Panel series started in 2003, shortly after the United States entered combat in Iraq. With the war came the increased potential for cadets to be in combat shortly after graduation, and this series evolved to help prepare them for their future in an uncertain world. The impact of this panel each semester continues to be profound and allows the corps to not only teach future leaders, but to honor those who are already serving the nation in harm’s way.

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