While her classmates in the class of 2003 are securing jobs, Tammy Gonzales could be going off to war.

Gonzales is one of 18 seniors in Kansas University’s ROTC programs who will be commissioned as military officers on Monday, the day after graduation.

“The thing I’m asked most is if I’m scared,” Gonzales said. “I wouldn’t say I’m scared. I’m nervous, but not scared.”

After all, it’s not the first time the 29-year-old Gonzales has been in the military. She went through the Army’s basic training program between her junior and senior years of high school in Clinton, Iowa.

After serving eight years as an enlisted soldier after high school, Gonzales decided to return to college and complete an ROTC program, which ends with cadets commissioned as military officers. She chose KU because it was relatively close to home.

Lt. Col. Brian DeToy, professor of military science, said Gonzales had been an unusual student for several reasons — she has military experience, she’s an older student and is a woman in a male-dominated program.

But Gonzales and the other graduates will be ready for military service wherever they’re called to serve, he said.

“With the pervasiveness of the coverage this year (in Iraq), they’ve seen so much, so there’s no trepidation for what it would be like,” DeToy said. “They’ve known for a while now what’s ahead of them. Now they’re thinking, ‘Wow. The other students are going to work at a Big Seven accounting firm, and I’m going off to a possible war.'”

Gonzales spent much of her enlisted time as an animal care specialist, treating military working dogs and soldiers’ pets. She was stationed in Washington, D.C., South Korea, Fort Leavenworth and finally Germany, where she met her husband, Peter, who now is an administrative specialist with the KU Public Safety Office.

ROTC cadet Tammy Gonzales, right, laughs with KU military instructors, from left, Master Sgt. Eric Butler, Sgt. 1st Class Mark Williams and Cpt. Cheryl Whelan. Gonzales attended an awards ceremony Thursday at the Military Science Building at Kansas University, where she was honored for her leadership skills, citizenship and academic achievements.

Gonzales said that experience helped her have the discipline to take on a full class load — she’s graduating in three years, not four — and working 15 to 20 hours a week at the Academic Resource Center in Jayhawker Towers.

“It amazes me when somebody says, ‘I slept past my morning class today,'” Gonzales said.

Her unusual background also has helped ROTC classes, said Nikki Dolce, a junior from Wichita.

“Just with her experience in working overseas, she has given insight to what it is like,” Dolce said.

And she said it had been helpful to have a woman to use as a role model.

“I don’t think that it is so much the leadership but it is the support of having another female there,” Dolce said. “Everyone has leadership, but you can’t lead without support.”

Although she said she was a loyal soldier, Gonzales admitted sometimes it was easier to conceal her Army background at KU to avoid criticism from fellow students.

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“Especially since Sept. 11, I don’t go telling a lot of people,” she said. “KU seems more like a liberal school. I don’t go around telling people I’m in ROTC. It’s easier to avoid those kinds of comments.”

Gonzales won’t have much time after graduation before returning to the Army. She reports June 2 to Fort Lewis, Washington, where she’ll be a temporary public affairs officer for a month, using the journalism degree she earned at KU.

Then, she’s off to Fort Leonard Wood, Mo., where she’ll receive training to become a chemical detection officer. Starting in February, she’ll be stationed in Fort Campbell, Ky.

Even with combat in Iraq, she said, she’s never had second thoughts about a military career.

“That really hasn’t changed my mind at all,” she said. “It just made me realize how important of a role I can play.”