Face of Defense: Student Follows Brothers Into Marine Corps

By Marine Corps Cpl. Joseph Scanlan

Marine Expeditionary Brigade Afghanistan

CAMP LEATHERNECK, Afghanistan, June 17, 2014 – Many young adults in the United States pursue college directly after graduating high school. While some continue to pursue a degree, others decide along the way to pursue a different path.

Marine Corps Cpl. Jonathan Hollis attended college immediately after high school, but after a few short years of enduring the monotonous routine, he said, he was fed up and sought an adventure. He’s now deployed here as an antitank missileman with Weapons Company, 1st Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment.

Hollis and his eight siblings were raised in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He was home-schooled until he was a teenager, and then he attended Caledonia High School.

“Because I was home-schooled, it was pretty strict at home, so when I got to public school, I never missed a homework assignment,” he said.

His high school grades earned him an engineering scholarship, and when he graduated, he went on to Grand Rapids Community College. He continued to earn good grades and made the dean’s list during his first year, he said, but he wasn’t content.

“I hated college,” Hollis said. “I didn’t like sitting in a room for hours upon hours every day, just repeating the same schedule. I would show up in the morning, do my classes and leave at night while having a job on the side. It was just the same thing every day, and I was sick of it.”

While Hollis was a student, two of his brothers who were infantrymen in the Marine Corps told him about their experiences, and that’s when he decided to become a Marine himself. He enlisted as an infantryman and departed for recruit training Dec. 10, 2012.

Three grueling months later, he underwent training at the School of Infantry, where he would become an infantryman. Hollis earned a significant position of leadership shortly into the training cycle. Midway into the training evolution, he was given the opportunity to choose which kind of infantryman he wanted to become.

“One of the things I liked to do while growing up was to build rockets,” he said. “So I was one of the few that really wanted to become an 0352 [antitank missileman].”

Hollis continued to lead Marines during the course through various events, and ultimately earned a meritorious promotion to lance corporal upon graduating from School of Infantry. He then reported to 1st Battalion, 7th Marines, at Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center Twentynine Palms, California.

He began predeployment training immediately upon arrival with the battalion. His training included aiding the 30-day Weapons and Tactics Instructor Course at Yuma Proving Ground, Arizona, a 10-day mission rehearsal exercise and a 30-day integrated training exercise to prepare him for his March 2 deployment to Afghanistan’s Helmand province. His hard work has not gone unnoticed.

“Hollis has exemplified what we like to see as a leader,” said Marine Corps Gunnery Sgt. Gerald Furnari, a platoon sergeant with Weapons Company, and a native of Franklin Square, New York. “He has separated himself from his peers since his arrival in the company. He did an outstanding job all throughout the workup. We sometimes put him in positions that he normally wouldn’t have occupied as somebody with his experience and time in service, but he showed us a lot of versatility, and he showed us through his good work ethic that he is somebody we can count on.”

Hollis has operated with Weapons Company during several missions here, participating in numerous patrols in Taliban-occupied areas and receiving enemy fire on multiple occasions. Weapons Company is slated to continue a high operational tempo throughout the summer in Helmand province before returning to the United States. His work ethic, intelligence, initiative and leadership ability earned Hollis a meritorious promotion to corporal June 2.

“Hollis is one of the best assets we have in our platoon, if not the company,” Furnari said. “When we return from this deployment, he is going to be one of the noncommissioned officers we lean on, because of his prior work experience and his performance. He’s going to be one of the individuals that we’re going to look at to lead the company during our next predeployment workup and into the next deployment.”