Sitting in the cockpit of a F-15 fighter jet, going from zero to 1875 mph with nothing but a few inches of glass between him and the sky has been his dream since he can remember. Brian Mackenzie is applying to the United States Air Force Academy (USAFA) in hopes of attending in the fall of 2015.

“I went to an air show in first grade, and I was just really fascinated by all the planes,” Mackenzie, senior, said. “I used to only read books about planes and flying when I was younger. It’s really hard to explain, but I have just loved flight for as long as I can remember.”

The typical office job did not suit his love of challenges, as his mom , Casey Mackenzie, describes, so he became adamant about joining the Air force and learning to fly.

“I was not surprised about Brian wanting to join the Air Force, because he has been passionate about it since kindergarten,” Mrs. Mackenzie said. “When I asked him in seventh grade about how he feels about flying commercial he just looked at me and said, ‘Those planes don’t go fast enough mom.’”

USAFA is located in Colorado Springs, Colorado. With a low yearly acceptance rate of 9.9 percent (compared to Mizzou’s 78.61 percent) Mackenzie works hard with the support of his parents and friends to turn all his application forms and recommendations in on time.

“We just remind him daily it’s an intense process and the equivalent of about four or five college applications rolled into one, so we just keep encouraging him,” Mrs. Mackenzie said.

Family is not the only source of support Mackenzie has. His friend Matt Maury, senior, said he was not surprised by Mackenzie’s choice of the Air Force.

“Initially, I didn’t really know a whole lot about USAFA, but as I found out more about it I really admired his ambition,” Maury said. “Brian has lots of essays to write for the applications so to support him he will send me his rough drafts and ask me for my input, and I just talk to him whenever he gets stressed out about all the things he has to do.”

Mackenzie keeps a bulletin board in his room of everything he must finish from the spring of his junior year, summer before senior year and winter of senior year to make sure he accomplishes everything he must do to get into the Academy.

“Applying to USAFA is basically like applying to any other highly selective school but you also have to get a nomination from a person in the government,” Mackenzie said. “The people that can do that is someone from your House of Representatives, or your two senators and technically the vice president has five nominations also, but that is very a very difficult nomination to get.”

Getting into USAFA is not the only way Mackenzie can become an Air Force Officer. Many colleges offer a ROTC program (Reserve Officer Training Corps) that lets students go to regular college while also training to become an officer.

“My backup plan is to do Air Force ROTC somewhere because I would still graduate at the same ranking as someone who would go to the academy,” Mackenzie said. “I would still be happy doing ROTC just because Air Force is what I really want to do.”