Living to serve: from Search and Rescue to U.S. Coast Guard

Senior Alta Martin rests during a search mission for the Washington County Sheri ’s Office Search and Rescue Team in the Jefferson Wilderness on Aug. 3, 2016.

Senior Alta Martin has already helped dozens of people during her high school years as a search and rescue volunteer, but she plans to help  many more in the coming years as a member of the United States Coast Guard.

This September, she will head to Cape May, New Jersey, for basic training, followed by three weeks on a ship at sea. After that, Martin will learn the skills for a specific position she hopes will turn into a full career.

She plans to go into marine enforcement, which involves boarding ships and drug interdiction, or become an aviation service technician. At four years, she will consider whether to re-enlist. She could stay in the branch for as many as 20 years.

Her decision to join the coastal defense force was influenced by her work with the Washington County Sheriff’s Office Search and Rescue Team (WCSAR), which she joined at age 15. Each Oregon county is required to open up a search and rescue program for young people in the community.

“I got into the colleges I applied for, but I knew that because of the search and rescue work I do now, it was something I wanted to continue doing,” she said. “When you find something you’re good at, you don’t want to quit it.”

Martin has participated in dozens of missions with WCSAR, which include missing-person searches, evidence searches and body recovery. She can receive a call-out for a search at any time, and this year also serves as Administrative Coordinator, meaning she assists in training new searchers and calling out members for searches.

“Doing public service work from a young age has pushed me to do something with my life to help others,” she said. “The more I can help people, the more I feel satisfied.”

The Coast Guard was a natural fit. As opposed to the other branches, “the Coast Guard’s main goal is to rescue and protect property,” she said.

Her advisor at WCSAR, Corporal Jessica Zieman, agrees. “[Alta] always wants to help, she’s very selfless, and does things for others without asking for anything in return.”

In addition to her character traits, the skills Alta picked up with the local agency will come in handy, said Zieman. “Her skills of navigation, survival, mapping will help in the Coast Guard, as well as leadership, teamwork and communication skills.”

Martin said some of her peers have questioned her decision not to go to college, but she said that was an uninformed judgment.

“I’m never going to quit my education,” she said. As a member of the Coast Guard, she will receive money to take classes online, and after four years, she will have the option to go to college for free at a state university.

Further, “[joining the Coast Guard is] something that I genuinely want to do, and I’m not going to give up a career and happiness when just because everyone else says I need to go to school.”

Rather than sitting in a classroom, she will be out on the water and serving her country.

“I’m excited to go do something that’s going to fulfill me physically and mentally. I like having the ability to challenge myself everyday with something new and different.”