Hillsdale students spending their semester in Washington D.C had their first group outing on Jan. 31.
They toured the Pentagon, and in the afternoon, a Hillsdale alumnus working for the FBI, Michael Carroll, gave this semester’s 18 Washington Hillsdale Internship Program participants a tour of the J. Edgar Hoover Building. The private tour allowed the students access to sections of the building barred from the public by post-9/11 security measures.
“I think my favorite part was the FBI, just because you see what kind of connections Hillsdale has in that they don’t even give public tours there anymore,” junior Korbin Kiblinger said, “And we got the chance to actually go in and see the educational facility and see what a Hillsdale alum did with his life.”
Junior Riley Workman agreed.
“I liked visiting the FBI, especially as we were given a tour by a Hillsdale grad. I learned some of the actions our government takes in the war against terror and was reassured as to the respect our law enforcement and military officers feel for our Constitution and way of life,” Workman said.
In the morning, the group’s mile and a half long tour through the Pentagon was led by members of the U.S. military.
“The Pentagon is so much like a mall – escalators in the middle and everything,” Kiblinger said. “When you see it from the outside, you just think it’s going to be a manly facility.”
The hallways were filled with displays detailing the history of America’s armed forces.
“I was impressed by the amount of historical and educational material they had in all the hallways,” junior Casey McKee said.
Along the tour, students visited the 9/11 memorial within the Pentagon, a room with low lighting, walls lined with metal, and five black acrylic panels, two of which list the names of those who died when American Airlines Flight 77 crashed into the building.
“The 9/11 memorial room was very powerful,” junior Aubrey Neal said. “I hadn’t realized how much of the Pentagon got destroyed in the crash, but they’ve done a very good job remembering the tragedy and honoring those heroes who were killed.”
Beyond their experiences in their internships and in the classroom at the Kirby Center, the WHIP students will take advantage of D.C. with more trips throughout the semester. The group’s next trip is a Shakespeare play this coming weekend.
“The fact that the school does these activities means we get to hang out with other Hillsdale students even though we don’t work at the same places,” Kiblinger said.