For some people, pursuing a career in the military stems from a family history of serving the country — they see parents, grandparents, siblings or other relatives join the military and follow suit.

Mike Matthews did not have this familial influence but he has still decided to pursue a career in the military. After graduating from Lake Washington High School in 2012, the Redmond native enrolled in the Virginia Military Institute (VMI) in Lexington, Va., where he will graduate from this spring with a degree in mechanical engineering.

Matthews said he has always wanted to help others and saw the military as a chance to do that.

“It’s more personal than you think,” he said about what he has discovered during his time at VMI about how the military works.

In addition to learning about how the military works, as a mechanical engineering student, Matthews is also learning about how different machines work.

Those machines include aircrafts.

Last fall, in November 2015, he and his 13 classmates in a flight mechanics course were given the opportunity to do some more hands-on learning for one of their assignments.

The cadets enrolled in the 400-level class were asked to take on the role of Soviet intelligence officers who are considering an invasion of Iran in 1979. As part of their preparation, the Soviets would have sought as much data as possible about the United States’ then-new fighter wunderkind, the F-16, which entered service with the U.S. Air Force in January 1979.

Part of the assignment included the students testing a 1/48th-scale model of the F-16 fighter jet in a small sub-sonic wind tunnel.

According to a VMI press release, the wind tunnel was frequently inoperable due to maintenance issues. This year, thanks to the efforts of Mike Cullen, the department’s lab mechanic, the tunnel became a viable option, the release states.

Col. Joe Blandino, who teaches the flight mechanics class, added that as is often the case with higher education, acquiring the funding for such equipment can also be difficult.

He said previously, his students were limited to paper studies so the chance to use a real-world scenario is too good to pass up, the release states.

“The tools that our students have coming out of this flight mechanics class, combined with their other mechanical engineering courses, are really what…Soviet intelligence officer[s] would have had in 1979 at their disposal,” Blandino commented in the release. “The idea is to make the project very practical and put it into a real-world context.”

Matthews and his classmates were to compare Soviet fighter aircraft during that time to the F-16 and see how they stood up to each other.

He said through the assignment, they were able to find the aircraft’s “drag polar,” which is specific to each aircraft and the relationship between its lift and its drag. From this, Matthews said you can figure out how an aircraft will perform under various conditions.

“That’s the whole idea,” he said.

In the press release, Matthews added, “All of the data for airplanes comes from wind tunnels. This is the kind of data they would have done when they were designing the F-16. Now we’re reproducing it, and that’s pretty awesome.”

Although Matthews is studying mechanical engineering, his focus is on nuclear engineering and the flight mechanics class was actually an elective. It was his first introduction into the aerospace world.

“I was always interested in planes though, so that kind of helped,” he said. “Overall, I thought it was a really good class.”

Flight mechanics was the second class Matthews took with Blandino, who is a U.S. Air Force veteran.

“He is just an outstanding student,” Blandino said about Matthews, adding that he is proud to have Matthews graduating from VMI.

Matthews said the reason he chose mechanical engineering is because growing up, he always enjoyed more hands-on projects and taking things such as cars and motorcycles apart. Initially, Matthews considered becoming a mechanic, but after fixing up a car for his senior project in high school, he realized he was more interested in the design end of things and coming up with ideas.

Matthews said at VMI, “you get out what you put in.” He said the school is a great place to be.

Following graduation, Matthews will join the U.S. Army. He will join the military police and enters basic officer training at the beginning of June, giving him only about two weeks off after he completes his time at VMI.

Matthews said as he is about to finish up with school, he is looking forward to the variety that awaits him.

“It’s something different,” Matthews said about the military lifestyle. “You never know what to expect.”