Army National Guard Soldier and nontraditional student Logan Korn is a senior at the Tombras School of Advertising and Public Relations. He transferred to the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, from Pellissippi State Community College where he studied business, economics, and history. Faculty in the Tombras School describe him as hardworking and a go-getter but he said he wasn’t always like that.
“I never tried very hard in high school. I did not have anybody at the time encouraging me to go to college,” he explained.
Korn grew up in Knoxville but moved to Alabama for a few years where he went to Hueytown High School, just 15 minutes north of Birmingham. As his high school graduation was approaching his senior year, he remembers telling a friend that he needed to fill out college applications. That friend quickly informed him that application deadlines had already passed.
“Part of the reason I didn’t go to college right out of high school is because I was really afraid to fill out all of the paperwork. I didn’t know how,” he said.
After high school, Korn went to Alabama Fire College with a desire to become an Emergency Medical Technician (EMT).
“I bought an apartment down in Tuscaloosa and a really crappy car. I think it was an ‘02 Hyundai that had been in an accident with like 200,000 miles on it. I loaded up everything that I owned into it, drove all the way down to Tuscaloosa, and got an apartment for $335 a month. It was a total crap hole kind of place. I didn’t have air conditioning or a microwave for a long time while I was down there,” he said.
Korn did not let his circumstances discourage him. The summer before going to fire college, Korn took a construction job to pay for his apartment and other expenses while in Tuscaloosa. After his first semester, Korn took off a semester to go back to work in construction to pay for his second semester.
He graduated from Fire College in 2017 and was ready to work. However, his driving record got in the way.
“Nobody tells you when you go to become a paramedic that having a very sparkly clean driving record is incredibly important, “ he said.
With a family filled with service members, Korn decided it was his turn to serve his country.
“I’d always wanted to join the army,” He said. “My dad was in the National Guard, my stepdad was in the Marine Corps, I had one grandfather who was in the Marine Corps and the other was in the Army National Guard, and then my great uncle died in World War II in the army.”
Korn joined the Army National Guard in 2018 and attended One Station Unit Training for close to six months, where he trained to become an M-1 Abrams Tank Crewman. He was deployed to Poland soon after to deter Russian aggression as part of Operation Atlantic Resolve.
As soon as he got back from Poland, Korn applied to Pellissippi State. He graduated with a general studies degree, transferred to UT, and spent his first semester in the Haslam College of Business.
“When I came over to UT I was nervous about coming here because it’s just such a big school and I was just used to that small, like maybe 30 people in a classroom,” he said.
After his first semester at UT, Korn transferred to the Tombras School to study public relations, where he said he was “pleasantly surprised” by the class sizes and how approachable the faculty were.
“I’ve had a fantastic time at CCI, I think it’s amazing. The professors that I’ve had are all just super experienced. They all really know what they’re talking about,” he said.
During his time at UT, Korn has visited the Tombras Agency, went to Atlanta with the Tombras School, and has been a writer for The Daily Beacon. He is currently an intern with UT Purpose Project and will be a science writing intern for Oak Ridge National Laboratory this summer. His goal is to be a science writer full-time.
Korn has also been accepted into three master’s programs at UT, Johns Hopkins University, and at Texas A&M University.
Korn’s non-traditional route to graduation isn’t the journey he expected, but he encourages others who might be scared to try something new to keep pushing forward.
Korn explained, “I realized that I had never tried at anything in my entire life. I had just coasted. There were little moments when I did, but anybody can try for a day. That’s too easy. To me, trying is dedication for years and years, to get results.”