Secret Agent Man (and Woman)!!!

A few nights ago we had a Career Seminar with Mary and Jim Davidson (Mary is our Community Resource Officer, Jim is her husband) where they talked about their lives in the Secret Service (where they met). It was fascinating to hear about their careers and their lives. Jim has protected 8 different presidents in his career and Mary has protected 4 (I think that is what she said). Mary was the 20th woman to become an agent for the Secret Service which is amazing when you consider that the Secret Service has been around since the late 1800's.

Here is a portion of her bio:

Mary is currently a contract Special Investigator for the US Secret Service and Vice-President of Davidson Strategic Resources (DSR), Inc. providing Executive Protection and Private Investigations. She earned a BA in Law Enforcement from the University of Maryland and is currently enrolled in a Master's Program for Criminal Justice at ASU. Mary studied International Criminal Justice at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark while pursuing her undergraduate degree. Mary spent over 20 years working more than full-time as a US Secret Service Special Agent. Her assignments took her throughout the US & the world while protecting the President and Vice-President of the United States, Foreign Heads of State and their families. Much of her career was spent investigating crimes against the US Government with several major cases in Europe and South America.

So....

The first day Mary stood up and they introduced her, the students were in awe of her. First of all, she is a gorgeous blond woman and second, she is a Secret Service agent who has lived all over the world training other agents and protecting some of our most important dignitaries! Well, now they call her "Nighthawk." Every night she is on duty as soon as the pool deck opens for the students. She makes rounds on the ship all night, checking on the students and helping them stay out of trouble. Well, NOTHING gets past Mary. She was trained to investigate, interrogate and intimidate and she ROCKS at her job. She is also very respected by the students.

Mary performs room searches as well, and we hear that she is very thorough. Apparently, Mary brings a set of tools and she removes ceiling panels, grates under refrigerators and searches in places you wouldn't even imagine that things could be hidden. We really admire her persistence in keeping our floating community safe.

When students violate one of the codes of conduct in the manual they are punished accordingly. The conduct team and our Executive Dean take these infractions very seriously. Punishments range from being expelled from the program and being sent home to being held on the ship when we are in port ("dock time").

Fun Facts:

-There was a whale playing in the wake of our ship today

-About 20% of the students her have bald heads because of Neptune Day