Showing students a path to success

For Army Sgt. Maj. Leon Johnson, senior JROTC instructor at Emmett J. Conrad High School, the military promised opportunities he did not imagine having. Now, at Conrad, he sees himself in a lot of the students and wants them to be aware of the opportunities that were available to him.

“This is something personal for me,” Johnson said. “When I come to school and I look at these kids, I think, ‘I was sitting in their seat one day. I didn’t have a lot of money; my parents were both working; and college wasn’t even an option.'”

A native of Peoria, Ill., Johnson came from a hardworking family with no means to afford college for 10 children. College wasn’t an option because they had to get a job and help out the family. 

But Johnson realized that his hometown did not offer the kind of success he wanted: young men, he said, seemed destined to wind up in retail, sales and the streets. 

“I was a pretty decent student in high school, but I ended up joining the Army at 18,” he said.

 When he completed basic training, Johnson was deployed to the Persian Gulf for Operation Desert Storm. By his second year, Johnson had already made sergeant, eventually reaching the rank of sergeant major.

“I’ve been to some cool places. I lived in Korea and Japan,” Johnson said. “I’ve lived all over the world. But the most important thing was that I was a medic by trade.”

Through the Army, Johnson received a bachelor’s degree in healthcare management and a master’s degree in educational technology from Louisiana State University. After he retired from the U.S. Army Medical Department at Fort Benning, Ga., he made his way to Dallas to take up a role as a Leadership Cadet Corps (LCC) at Nova Academy. He later taught middle-school students at the Dallas ISD JROTC and developed a curriculum forum for the School of the Talented and Gifted at Pleasant Grove. The district took notice of Johnson’s contributions and recruited him as a Senior Army Instructor at Conrad.

 “I’ve been at Conrad for five years, and ever since, I ask myself how I can give our students the opportunities and the exposure to be successful in life,” Johnson said. “When I meet my students, each one of them is different, but I try to put myself in their situation, and say, ‘I wish I had an instructor or a teacher that was compassionate enough to see things that I can’t see that will help me succeed.”’ 

Johnson said the JROTC program at Conrad started with only 100 students and is now averaging 150 per class. The highest enrollment, he said, was around 210 students. The program has two instructors—First Sgt. (Ret.) William Henderson, who is the Army instructor, and Johnson. 

The JROTC program focuses primarily on community engagement, and every December Johnson’s class sets off to the Vickery Meadow’s annual Festival of Lights to dis

tribute bags to families. Last year, Johnson said, they handed out over 600 bags. Other community service activities include cleaning up trash, placing flags in cemeteries for Veterans Day, and visiting elderly soldiers’ homes.

“It’s just an opportunity for our kids to give back to the community and be a part of something that’s going to help make it better,” Johnson said.

 The JROTC is a program where students enter to learn but leave to lead. In addition to community engagement, JROTC students learn archery, participate in physical fitness competitions, are exposed to robotics and drones, and, more recently, compete in the JROTC Leadership and Academic Bowl in Washington, D.C. Last year, Conrad became the only school in the district—and one of the only schools in the state—to make it to the national competition.

“A lot of things that we do are as a drill team,” Johnson said. “We really try to give our kids opportunities and experiences that are going to allow them to be favorable and competitive in a global society.”

Johnson’s personal mission, he said, is to transform students’ lives through education, leadership training, and personal mentorship.

 “If you can reach one, you can teach one,” he said. “In JROTC, we are a family. You’re not just a number or score—you’re family.”

 Johnson denied the myth that JROTC is only for students with military aspirations. On the contrary, JROTC is for anybody who is interested in cultivating character and integrity.

 “This program is really building the fundamentals for great leaders, not only in our schools, but even outside of our schools,” Johnson said. “And I just want other

s to be able to realize that this is not only a great program, but it’s also giving students life skills that they may not get in any other type of educational curriculum.”

 Johnson expressed gratitude for the leadership within both the school and the district for their support of JROTC:

 “My hope is that not only the school leadership, but even our senators and our congressmen realize that JROTC is such a great program, because it’s going to give our future leaders the basic fundamentals of integrity, character, decision-making,” Johnson said.

 In the end, Johnson said, he wants his students to feel as if they are a part of something bigger than themselves.

 “All it takes is one person to believe in you,” he said. “The sky is the limit.”