Retired Marine Gunnery Sgt. Harry Leeds, a former drill instructor, talks with Marine Gunnery Sgt. Sandra Center. His grandson, John Leeds, graduated in Class 05-08.

On the raw February night before graduation, as waves crash ashore Easton’s Beach, Matthew Gottschalk leads his father into the Atlantic Beach Club for the traditional “Hi, Moms” party for soon-to-be officers and their loved ones.

Of the five students The Journal followed, Gottschalk is the only one left in Class 05-08. The other four candidates, whose failures lengthened their stays at OCS, will graduate over the next month in other classes.

Gottschalk, a future aviator, looks more confident and 16 pounds lighter than he did when his father saw him three months ago.

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“He’s always wanted to be a pilot. He’s living his dream is what he is doing,” says Rick Gottschalk, who flew in from Denver for the graduation.

Gottschalk takes his dad to the center of the banquet room’s dance floor to meet Marine drill instructor Gunnery Sgt. Sandra Center and to take their picture together. They wait their turn in line.

“She’s nice,” he tells his father in a hushed voice, “but she flips that switch…”

“That’s her job,” said Rick Gottschalk, who served in the Navy for 23 years, retiring as a senior chief in the reserves. He tends to tutor his son about the Navy, but then catches himself, saying, “I’m preaching to the choir.”

After dinner, Navy Senior Chief Jonathan Calloway takes the stage. A submariner for 20 years, he strikes a somber tone. He says the real purpose of OCS is not about physical fitness or academics. It’s about joining a team and handling stress.

He tells the story of Lt. Michael P. Murphy, a 29-year-old Navy SEAL from New York, who was killed in Afghanistan in 2005, five years after his own “Hi, Moms” celebration. Murphy, confronting a larger enemy force, left safe cover to establish communications with headquarters. While being shot at repeatedly — and hit — he called in his unit’s location to request support.

“He made a decision in a stressful environment. He gave his life,” says Calloway. “You one day may have to make that decision.”

To the parents, he says, “Your sons and daughters are going to make decisions … that may take someone’s life or damage equipment.” Referring to the challenges presented at OCS, he says, that is why “the class does what it does … They faced their fears and overcame them.”

Center asks everyone in the class who confronted fears, dealt with adversity or faced failure to stand. They all do.

Among them is John Kha, who actually quit when he was in Class 03-08. A college valedictorian who majored in engineering, he failed the RLP inspection twice and felt completely demoralized. As he went up the chain of command to get approval to D.O.R. (drop on request), he had a change of heart. Weeks later, he was allowed to join Class 05-08 on its first day. He went on to fail RLP (Room, Locker and Personnel) a third time, but passed on his fourth try.

Now Kha, 22, whose heroes in his youth were famous Navy Admirals Chester Nimitz and George Dewey, is headed to the highly selective Navy nuclear power school in Charleston, S.C.

“That’s one of the lessons you learn at OCS,” he says when asked later about his OCS experience. “If you get down, you have to pick yourself back up and keep going. It’s not whether you fail. It’s how you pick yourself back up.”

James Younts, only 19, is also standing. He’s about to become one of the youngest officers in the fleet. Home-schooled in Columbus, Ohio, he graduated from college last spring, at an age when most people have just finished high school. He is now on his way to becoming a pilot.

Center then demonstrates how the students have become a fit, cohesive unit.

“Get on my dance floor right now!” she barks, directing them into platoon formation behind her.

She orders them to run in place. “Aye, ma’am!” they reply loudly and in unison. For pushups, when she gives the command, they reply “Down, aye, ma’am” and “Up, aye, ma’am.”

“Now when I tell you,” she says, summoning up all the phony sternness she can, “you will go to your families and enjoy the rest of the night. Now move!”

“Kill,” they reply, exactly as they were taught.

Everyone laughs.

The room is darkened and photographs of the students exercising and taking orders appear on a screen. The most agonizing moments at OCS are rendered amusing by a soundtrack with the lyrics “Shout, shout, let it all out,” and “Do you really want to hurt me?”

The party wraps up. Students know they must wake early and be sharp for graduation.

“I’m looking forward to that first salute,” says Gottschalk.

TWO WEEKS LATER, at the Hotel Viking, there’s another “Hi, Moms” party, this one for three of Gottschalk’s former classmates — Adam Cole, Nicole Lobecker and Jason Moehlmann.

Lobecker and Moehlmann showed up on the first day not looking terribly fit and their loved ones remark tonight on their new appearance. Lobecker has lost 15 pounds, but says the biggest difference is in her waist and hips, both 3 inches narrower.

“She looks great. She’s a little more trim,” says Lobecker’s dad, William. “They worked her hard. She said it was more intense than boot camp.”

“She looks more mature,” adds her mother, Terry.

Moehlmann’s mother, Becky, says, “He does look skinnier.” And, she adds, “He has no hair.” She also thinks he seems more humble.

His sister, Jaclyn, has noticed a change too, one undoubtedly cultivated at OCS.

“He yells in my face more,” she says.

His mother was not thrilled when he acted on his long-standing desire to join the military. That happened after his solid grades in industrial management landed him a good-paying desk job at Shell Oil.

“There’s some anxiety,” she admits. But “he’s in good hands and he’s doing what he wants to do. We always said, ‘Do what you want to do, not for money.’ ”

Adam Cole’s dad says that after three years in the Navy, his son “was still a kid.” During those years, however, his son always had a knack for uniting his peers in volunteer efforts.

“I said if people are willing to follow you, you should go for OCS,” he says. Now, he says, “He seems more developed, He’s a little more mature.”

The next morning, they attend graduation. Both he and his father’s eyes glisten with tears as they shake hands.

“I’m proud of you,” his father says.

“Wow, that was a lot of hard work,” says Cole. “Our whole experience here is meant to pay deference to others. Now that respect is shifted to us. It’s a good feeling.”

After the ceremony, Lobecker’s brother Joshua is waiting for her, in his sailor’s uniform. He and his sister enlisted on the same day and he is now a hospital corpsman in the reserves. He faces his older sister and salutes her.

“I’m going to cry,” she says. Then she waves a hand in front of her, and says, “I’m not going to do it.”

Sarah Engemann graduates last, with Class 07-08. She spent nearly four weeks in Holding Company, under Master Gunnery Sgt. Robert Foshee, the chief Marine drill instructor. On the first day, he correctly predicted she would have difficulty with the physical fitness tests. She eventually did pass and as he got to know her better, he would tell a reporter that the smiling, quick-to-laugh student was doing well and would make a good officer.

“I didn’t know if her sense of humor would kill her,” says her father, Timothy Engemann, after she received her first salute. “I’m holding back my tears.”

During the Christmas break, Engemann got engaged to her boyfriend, Rodney Bogen. She had left the ring at home, but has it on now as he hugs her.

After the ceremony, the graduates receive their new IDs, the ones with the abbreviation ENS — short for ensign — on them. They have bags to finish packing and move out of their rooms. Lobecker takes her unflattering, thick Navy-issue glasses out of a drawer and bends them back and forth several times until they snap.

TWO WEEKS EARLIER, on the morning of Matthew Gottschalk’s graduation, families are seated in folding chairs on the wooden floor of Kay Hall, a World War II-era Quonset-style building used as a gymnasium. The Navy Band Northeast is on their left on a stage.

The members of Class 05-08 march into platoon formation across the gym, facing the audience. They are wearing dress blues and white gloves. On each collar is an ensign bar. On each sleeve, a single ensign’s stripe. They are ready to be commissioned into their new ranks.

The next two graduating classes, wearing khaki uniforms and carrying rifles, march in behind them. When they stop and stand at parade rest, they place the rifle butts down at their sides. The student leaders of Class 05-08 stand facing the audience and the podium.

“Sir, the parade is formed,” one of the students tells the ranking officer on the podium.

The families take photographs of the graduates as they stand completely still in formation. Just as they were instructed on their first day at OCS, they maintain a 1,000-yard stare, not acknowledging their loved ones.

When the crowd is seated again, a bell rings and a whistle blows signaling the arrival of the official party, including Capt. Joseph A. McBrearty, commanding officer of Newport’s Officer Training Command. Following the National Anthem, class leader Geoffrey Zann turns and marches in front of the three classes before bellowing, “The orders of the day are to graduate and commission Class 05-08.”

Guest speaker Capt. Leland Sebring, commanding officer of the Naval Academy Preparatory School, reminds the class “this is only the beginning” for them. He notes that 10 will join the supply corps, 13 will go on to become aviators, 4 are going into intelligence, 9 are becoming surface warfare officers, 2 will become submariners, 2 are going into aviation maintenance, 1 will be a civil engineer and 1 will be a SEAL.

“In a few minutes you will be commissioned as officers in the United States Navy,” he says. “Congratulations and welcome aboard.”

During the ceremony, a graduate apparently locks her knees and collapses. Medics escort her off. But soon she returns. The graduates march around the perimeter of the hall and assume a new position in the center of the room to take the oath of office.

Gottschalk raises his right hand and speaks at the same time as the others.

“I, Matthew Gottschalk, having been appointed as ensign in the United States Navy, do solemnly reaffirm that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic,” he begins. He ends, “So help me God.”

Following a gung-ho version of “Anchors Aweigh,” Center announces, “You are dismissed.”

Gottschalk and his fellow classmates toss their caps into the air.

Now it’s time for their first salute.

He and his classmates take turns walking alone across a stage and standing in front of Center and Calloway. The pair of enlisted service members, now outranked by the new officers, salute Gottschalk and his fellow ensigns.

Then, while shaking their hands, the graduates observe a tradition of honoring enlisted service members: They deftly slip a silver dollar — one made of real silver — into Center’s and Calloway’s hands.

When his son walks off the stage, Rick Gottschalk shakes his hand and says, “Congratulations, Ensign.”

Gottschalk is beaming, but composed as always.

“During the oath, that’s when I felt it was for real,” he says. Referring to his first research into becoming a Navy pilot, he says, “Ten years I’ve been waiting for this.”

But, he says, “I still haven’t gotten there. I don’t have my wings yet.” He looks to his father and says, “I’m ready to go.”

As he walks outdoors and down the street to his barracks to pack up and leave, an underclassman salutes him.

“Congratulations, sir,” he says.

“Sir?” Gottschalk says amazed while continuing on. “You’re kidding me!”

rsalit@projo.com