Sean Rosario graduated from Sachem in 1991. He is one of three Sachem alums to serve as a U.S. Navy SEAL, and spent many years as part of the highly specialized SEAL Team SIX unit.
Rosario credits his Sachem upbringing for helping shape his perspective and development. Those traits helped him become a highly effective leader who reached peak physical and mental ability while serving his country.
In recent years he used his knowledge of the impact of special operations on veterans and founded the Warrior Health Foundation.
Sachem Alumni Association President Chris R. Vaccaro caught up with Sean …
CV: I’ll get right out with my usual opening question … what does Sachem mean to you?
SR: It’s where it all started for me. It helped shape what I wanted to do in the future. On another note, I also staged the biggest fight in Sachem High School history. It was over a girl too. They sent about 500 letters home for people who went to see the fight. It was near the pizza place in the Waldbaum’s shopping center [where Strathmore is today]. That got my dad and [Sachem High School Principal] Dennis James on a first name basis.
CV: You played football. What was that experience like?
SR: I started playing football when I went to Seneca and continued that in high school. As a stipulation of the fight, I could not play football my senior year. I was on varsity as a junior. The coaches were no nonsense guys and I wish we had more of that these days, especially Bill Batewell. He had a way of connecting, getting right to the point and making it palatable and easy to understand. We had the opportunity to go up and play Brockton High School. That was interesting because at the time they were a top ranked team in the country. They beat us by a touchdown but it was still a great experience to be up there and play those guys.
CV: What was next after Sachem?
SR: I was pretty determined. I knew I wasn’t prepared for college. I looked at the military as an option. It was shortly after the movie “Navy SEALs” came out. I was doing all the reading and research that I could to find out about the SEALs. I joined the Navy and left immediately after the summer I graduated to go to bootcamp in San Diego. I wish I could have gone to BUDS (Basic Underwater Demolition Seal) training right after, but I had to spend 16 months on a Navy ship in Virginia. I remember floating off the coast of Mogadishu, Somalia and got word that I was able to go to BUDS.
CV: Let’s talk about BUDS. It’s intense and there are countless documentaries and books about the experience that attendees endure.
SR: It’s the hardest military training in the world. That’s simply due to the mental aspect of it. But what it meant to me, it’s an extreme accomplishment. Something worthy of being proud of; just to be part of that alumni. I was lucky enough to finish my first try. I was in BUDS class 196. Started with 138 guys. At graduation there were 20 of us, and out of those, myself and five others were the only ones to start from day one because everyone else was a roll in from a previous class.
CV: You’re in a rare class to successfully make the coveted – and dangerous – SEAL Team SIX. How did that manifest and what can you share?
SR: It was a goal of mine. After my sights had been set on what I wanted to do, I wanted to go to the top and excel in everything I could. After BUDS, I went to airborne school in Fort Benning, Georgia. After five successful jumps you get your wings. Then I reported to my first SEAL Team, FOUR, in Little Creek, Virginia. It was pre-9/11, so at the time the area of responsibility was Latin America. I did four deployments down there working with just about every country and their special operations units on tactics, techniques and procedures. I was able to put in a request, interview and screen for SEAL Team SIX. Got accepted and went through the 2000 selection class. Started with 66 guys and finished with about 25-30.
BUDS is six months. Then SQT- SEAL qualification training three-month advanced training and you roll right into a platoon or troop and hit the ground running. When you go through selection for Team SIX, that’s an additional seven month course. The focus is ratcheted up 10 fold. Focus, attention to detail, it’s very focused on shooting. Physical fitness is a priority, but the mission is very focused and different from the other SEAL teams. They’re looking for high aptitude training, thinking and decision making. It’s an incredible process to really get the product they want.
CV: How about your deployments with SEAL Team SIX, are we able to talk about your experiences?
SR: I went into my first assault squadron and it wasn’t even a year before 9/11 happened. I did four combat deployments, three in Afghanistan and one in Iraq. It was busy and interesting. That was across five years. One thing that did make news when I was there was a POW hostage rescue, the first successful American POW rescue since World War II. We rescued Jessica Lynch. It was an interesting operation. It was a completely non pervasive environment. The U.S. Marine Corp had not pushed across the river and taken the city yet. She was being held in a hospital. We developed a course of action and assaulted from the air and ground. Within seven minutes we had her and within 20 minutes she was being flown out. It was a great outcome and exactly what we needed, especially for boosting morale back home.
CV: When did you decide to get out of the Navy?
SR: It was for family reasons. That deployment tempo was not conducive to family life. When you’re at that level, at that team, you are not home for 250 days out of the year. That’s a combination of overseas deployment or out of town training. It takes a toll. I made a clean break and got out of the Navy completely.
CV: You still had plenty to offer and with the SEAL background, there are a number of leadership and training opportunities at your fingertips?
SR: I ended up falling into another job where I was an instructor training another U.S. government agency to deploy overseas. I went to work with them and deployed overseas again two more times to Pakistan. Finally, I left all of that behind and entered the private sector in 2008 where I worked with defense and intelligence solutions to U.S. and government clients in Latin America.
In 2018 I founded the Warrior Health Foundation for special operations veterans. We provide holistic therapy for them, mitigating the effects of operating syndrome. It’s something that’s long overdue, little by little we’re making a difference and improving quality of life for these vets.
CV: Let’s come full circle. Looking back, what was Sachem’s impact on your journey of service?
SR: It had a lot to do with football. Being part of a team. That team mentality. It’s not the individual, it’s the team. No individual on a football team is winning the game, it’s a team effort. That carries over to the SEALs because it’s about the team. The entire team mentality that the coaches were able to instill, those hard to learn lessons where you fail and pay for it physically, makes you think and remember they want you to do it for a reason. The reason is dedication to your team and mission and through those failures you learn to never make that same mistake again. It’s powerful.