Senior Spotlight: Katya Withrow

On the way to a track meet, riding in school bus toward Winston-Salem, Katya Withrow looked at her smart phone and saw the email from the office of U.S. Rep. Kathy Manning. She opened it and squealed. 

She later told her sister. But she waited a few days to tell her parents. She didn’t want to tell them on the phone. She wanted to tell both of them in person and let them know their encouragement and support had paid off. 

Katya got into the U.S. Military Academy in West Point, N.Y.  

“They cried when I told them, and I haven’t seen my dad cry very much,” Katya says. “It made me cry because I don’t see that emotion, that reaction from him very much. It definitely showed me how dear I am to him and how proud he was of me. 

“He knew how hard everything I had done to get to that point. But no matter how hard it was — and it was — I never complained. I did it anyway.” 

Shaping a Leader  

Katya comes from a family of six. She’s the oldest daughter. Her dad teaches psychology at N.C. A&T and GTCC; her mom is a critical care nurse in the U.S. Army Reserve and works in the intensive care unit at Cone Health. 

Katya enrolled in Middle College at UNCG because it’s a school for students interested in a healthcare career. Katya always wanted to become a nurse like her mom, and her brother, Daniel, graduated in 2020 from Middle College, and he liked it. 

To get accepted to West Point is no easy feat. It takes some kind of drive both physically and mentally. And growing up in a family of six with three older brothers, Katya learned early that she wanted to prove something not to her family, but to herself. 

Her parents had always encouraged her from Brooks Global Studies School to The Academy at Lincoln and finally Middle College. Her dad became one of her key mentors. He encouraged her to pursue leadership opportunities in organizations that challenged her. 

She joined Troop 111, one of the first all-girl Boy Scout troops in Guilford County. She later became a member of Troop 230, headquartered at Greensboro’s Irving Park United Methodist Church.  

She became a senior patrol leader, and like her dad and two of her brothers, Daniel and Nicholas, she became an Eagle Scout. She was 14 when she earned the accolade after completing her project — leading and supervising the work to create a quarter-mile gravel trail at Horsepower Therapeutic Learning Center, a non-profit in High Point.  

Her dad then found something else that would help with her leadership: the Burlington Composite Squadron, part of the country’s Civil Air Patrol Cadet Program for students between the ages of 12 to 18.  She joined shortly after starting her freshmen year at Middle College. She liked the idea of learning about aerospace history and challenging herself with something totally new. Still, joining something new was hard. 

“When I first started, I was very shy and reserved, but I had mentors who encouraged me to go after these staff leadership positions,” Katya says. “As I did that, I became more confident because I realized you can’t become a leader overnight, and having those experiences taught me that it’s OK to make mistakes. You can learn from them. And that really changed me.” 

With the Burlington Composite Squadron, Katya stepped into all kinds of leadership roles and received all kinds of awards. Her writing improved; her public speaking improved; and she began to think about life after high school, a life that she came to believe included the military. 

She first thought about the U.S. Air Force Academy. She applied and talked to an Air Force graduate. But what the graduate told Katya changed the trajectory of her life. 

“The more competitive nature of West Point,” the graduate told her, “might fit you better.” 

A Sailboat Memory  

Katya stands an inch over five feet. But don’t let her short stature fool you. It didn’t fool her. In her personal leadership plan for the Burlington Composite Squadron, she wrote: 

“I felt as if my size made it to where I wouldn't be respected. I was wrong. After joining Civil Air Patrol, I realized it wasn't how I looked that made me a leader, it was my determination, my vision, and my willingness to succeed.”  

That innate confidence led Katya to get involved with Sea Scouts, another program affiliated with Scouting America. Five months after getting involved with Burlington Composite Squadron, she joined Sea Scout Ship 4019, headquartered at Shiloh Presbyterian Church in Burlington.  

Like with Boy Scouts and the Civil Air Patrol, she saw Sea Scouts as a way to help improve her leadership skills. 

She applied for a Sea Scout leadership program that involved spending 10 days on a 41-foot sailboat in San Francisco Bay. She was one of seven Sea Scouts accepted for the program. At 14, she was the youngest. She slept on deck, learned more about leadership and was in charge for one day of sailing and navigating the 41-foot vessel.  

She turned 15 during the 10-day course. The Sea Scouts from California and Virginia sang “Happy Birthday” to her on the San Francisco Bay. 

“It’s so close to my heart,” Katya says about that 10-day excursion. “All seven of us created this bond, and some of us still talk to this day.” 

More Than Just a Marathon 

Now, back to the school bus. 

The Middle College doesn’t have sports team. So, Katya had to play sports with her neighborhood school. That was Grimsley High. She took up cross-country and track because she liked running. By her senior year, she was named All-Conference. 

She has run three marathons: the City of Oaks Marathon in Raleigh, the San Francisco Marathon, and the Air Force Marathon in Ohio. 

For her college application essay, she wrote about running the Air Force Marathon and how she gasped for air, stopped and vomited as she was stooped over and crying. Medics came. She refused their help. She wanted to finish. She did.  

“Recovering from this intense challenge, I realized my time was insignificant,” she wrote her in college app essay. “The resilience, fortitude, and willpower shown when I wanted to quit outshined any slow race time. This wasn’t a test of just my physical capabilities, this was a test of mental strength as well.” 

Katya graduated May 29 from Middle College at the UNCG Auditorium on Tate Street. She now becomes the school’s first graduate to get accepted to West Point. She plans to major in life sciences to branch into the Army’s medical services just like her mom. 

When she looks back and how it all happened, she points to the mentors who helped her: John McPhail, the scoutmaster of Troop 230; Kathleen Maxfield, the former squadron commander of the Burlington Composite Squadron; and of course, her parents. 

Yet, pore through her accomplishments, and you realize Katya — a marathon runner, the Eagle Scout and All-Conference cross-country runner who stands an inch over five feet — has inside her this indefatigable spirit to make it in whatever she does.  

Just read her essay on why she wants to attend West Point. Then, read her first six words. 

Duty. Integrity. Honor. Excellence. Selflessness. Country. 

That says it all.