A University of Texas at Dallas graduate student has become the first member of the university's Army ROTC unit, the Comet Battalion, to earn the Reconnaissance Commando badge, the top award at the Army ROTC Advanced Camp, the university announced Thursday.
Cadet Ammar Abupakr, who is working on a master's degree in public policy in the School of Economic, Political and Policy Sciences, earned the RECONDO badge at the camp last summer at Fort Knox. Fewer than 5% of the camp's graduates received it in 2026, according to the UT Dallas news release.
What it took
About 6,000 cadets attend the 35-day capstone camp each year, usually between their junior and senior years of college or between the first and second years of graduate school.
To earn the badge, Abupakr had to pass every physical and technical evaluation without a retest or failure, score at least 80 points on each event of the Army fitness test, complete the land navigation course without error and score 90% or higher on several written and hands-on tests, the release says.
Peer evaluations also count. Capt. Jansen Cole, the military science instructor who leads the battalion, told the university that cadets who do not help others during evaluations tend to score poorly with their peers.
The release describes one moment at the gun range: Abupakr hit 14 of 40 targets in a warmup, took a break to eat and came back to hit 33 of 40.