Georgia Military College (GMC) celebrated the official grand opening of the NewDay USA Center of Leadership Sept. 12. The event featured a ribbon cutting with NewDay USA and GMC representatives and a keynote address from General James N. Mattis (USMC, Ret.).
The groundbreaking for the center was in November of 2021 and though programs have already been hosted inside, the ribbon cutting represented the official opening of the NewDay USA Center, hosted by both parties responsible for its creation.
“NewDay USA is an institution that does mortgages for veterans and supports veterans and their families. Their ideals, missions, and values are rooted in supporting veterans and military families,” said Col. Amy Lee, principal of Georgia Military College Preparatory School. “We first became connected with them because they were supporting four Gold Star Families to attend our school through paying their tuition. These are students that lost a parent to the war on terror.
“Over time, our institutions realized NewDay USA’s values and mission aligned well with GMC’s mission statement and values,” explained Lee. “Presently, through a partnership with NewDay USA, they are hosting 45 NewDay Scholars who are able to attend GMC Prep because of their support, and we are able to host the Leadership Lecture Series.”
The nearly 29,000-square-foot education center named after NewDay USA is used for Georgia Military College Preparatory’s (GMC Prep) Fine Arts Programming and the Leadership Lecture Series that brings well-known leaders to Milledgeville to speak with students and the community. The building caters to kindergarten through junior college, and to the community.
“Every single day our middle school and high school musical theater and production crew are using the building for classes. We also use it for the Fine Arts Showcase in the fall and spring,” said Lee. “Georgia Military College develops leaders based on our military heritage and at the core of that is the leadership and character development of our students. As such, we believe fine arts is a part of that leadership development.”
On a day-to-day basis, the center will be used for GMC Prep’s Fine Arts, including musical theater, band, art galleries, and performances. The building was built to provide office space, a stage, a greenroom, a classroom, an orchestra pit, a guest artist suite, costume areas, production areas, seats for about 750 people, and more.
“It is a place where our entire core, which refers to all of our battalions in both the preparatory school and junior college, can interact with each other and develop as leaders,” said Lee. “The building itself also provides us a space to bring in leaders for our Leadership Lecture series, where well-known leaders in our country and community can speak directly to our students and Baldwin County residents.”
During opening day, Mattis was the invited speaker for the Leadership Lecture Series. Mattis served as the 26th Secretary of Defense and served in the Marines for four decades. According to his biography, Mattis “commanded Marines at all levels, from an infantry rifle platoon to a Marine Expeditionary Force.”
After retiring from the Marines, he became a Davies Family Distinguished Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, specializing in the study of leadership, national security, strategy, innovation, and the effective use of military force. He also co-edited the book, Warriors & Citizens: American Views of Our Military.
“He really focused on the students when he spoke, because our cadets step up and lead our student body. He spoke about how each day, everyone has the opportunity to be a leader and that sometimes through that, we will make mistakes but learning from each mistake is a fundamental part of being a leader,” said Lee. “His biggest lesson was the three L’s of leadership, which mean that to be a good leader, you must listen first, learn from what others are saying, and then lead.”
Leaders like Mathis are chosen through the partnership of NewDay USA and GMC. Both offer ideas and come to a consensus to choose the speaker. The goal of the series is to host at least one leader a year who can speak to both GMC Prep and junior college students and the wider community.
“Our hope for the NewDay USA Center of Leadership is for it to be a communal space for our institution and community, whether that’s attending a lecture series or watching one of our upcoming performances,” said Lee. “It’s a space where leaders are being actively developed and where future leaders can be inspired.”