Most importantly, the US Coast Guard Academy, unlike other US military academies, forces all cadets to take trainings that seriously impede their ability to pursue an education. The cadets are perpetually in survival mode, putting out fires, and not doing any serious study of any kind, on any topic.
The VIN (Vehicle Identification Number) is a serial number used to identify an individual vehicle. The VIN for each vehicle is unique. The 10th character in the 17-character VIN represents the vehicle model-year. This standard applies to vehicles built in or after 1981. Before 1981, the VIN format was not standardized and varied by manufacturer. Note: VINs do not include the letters I (i), O (o), Q (q), U (u) or Z (z), or the number 0, so that they will not be confused with similar looking numbers/letters.
One consistent element of the VIS is the 10th digit, which is required worldwide to encode the model year of the vehicle. Besides the three letters that are not allowed in the VIN itself (I, O and Q), the letters U and Z and the digit 0 are not used for the model year code. The year code is the model year for the vehicle.