GROVE CITY - Kent Uber could have been going to a Division I school next year, studying chemical engineering and playing defensive and offensive tackle.

Uber was named player of the week by the newspaper more than once during football season. He also wrestled and threw discus.

He was third in his class at Grove City High School

with a 98 percent grade average. His math score on his SATs was a perfect 800, and overall he scored 1,520.

But as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the 18-year-old perfect college candidate will spend two years teaching others about his religion before heading off to school.

"I made the decision when I was very young that this is what I wanted to do," said Kent, who will follow in the footsteps of his three older brothers after hearing how fulfilling their mission work had been.

Kent's four younger brothers say they also plan to follow the lead. The eldest child and the lone daughter, Marci, did not go on a mission trip. Women are not as strongly encouraged to do mission work as men are in the religion.

"It's their decision," their father, John Uber, said, making clear a mission trip is not required.

In fact, while Kent said the offers of scholarships from college coaches wasn't tempting because he had already made up his mind to serve, his parents said he didn't immediately reveal his choice, and they were going to support him either way.

Vaughn Uber, 22, went as far as visiting college campuses before he made his decision to do mission work. Vaughn's mission work was done in Montreal and northern Quebec.

On a typical day, he would study until 10 a.m. and then go to the subway, apartments and public places trying to teach people about his religion.

If someone was rude to him, he thanked him for his time and walked away.

"I'm not going to try to force someone to listen," said Vaughn, whose two-year mission began shortly after Sept. 11, 2001.

He has since returned, married Tasha, whom he met in Montreal, and has a 3-month-old son, Aidan. The three are now living in his parents' house, and Vaughn is set to start classes at Slippery Rock University.

Ian Uber, now 24 and attending the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md., did his mission work in Fiji.

Logan Uber, 20,

is six months from finishing his mission in Guam and the Martial Islands.

Logan will not be home before Kent leaves on his mission trip in August.

Kent has time to gather his supplies, get the right forms and identification, and say goodbye at the airport.

The length of time between receiving the (mission acceptance) letter and leaving varies. Assignment location is revealed in another letter sometime in between. It leaves enough time to find sales on supplies, John Uber said.

Men are required to bring 20 white shirts and a varying amount of suits. Before Vaughn left, he and his father went to a department store sale.

The first location didn't have all 20, so they drove to another location to find the rest. Vaughn was required to bring three dark suits as well.

Ian only needed one suit to wear on the plane.

Flying to the different mission locations was the first time each young man had flown.

Before beginning their work, missionaries make a stop at the Mission Training Center in Utah. How long they are there depends on where the mission will be.

For someone learning a foreign language, like Vaughn who was given French lessons, it can be about six weeks, but for others it's only three.

From the center, missionaries leave for exotic locations, or, in Vaughn's case, Montreal.

But even the hockey-hungry city held adventures for Vaughn. He said he was once stuck on an elevator in an apartment building between the 20th and 21st floors for four hours.

While in the elevator, he wrote a last will and testament, dividing his belongings among his brothers, he said. Later, his mother found the letter, which she didn't know existed.

"I opened the letter, which began 'If you are reading this, I didn't make it out alive,'" she said. "If I didn't know what happened, I would have been upset."

Vaughn had told her of the incident in a letter, since missionaries are only allowed to call home twice a year, on Mother's Day and Christmas.

"You leave things out, like getting attacked, so (your parents) don't worry," Vaughn said. Months after returning, he still hadn't told his mother about a man on the subway who was angry about Vaughn's evangelical efforts.

Logan sends a hand-drawn, stick figure cartoon called "Stick Man" in his letters. In order to get the next edition, someone from the family has to write a letter to Logan, and e-mails don't count.

The family can e-mail Logan when he is in more industrialized areas, but lately he's been without Internet access.

The Ubers say letters are a family event. When one comes, it gets passed from hand to hand, read and reread, Marta Uber said. She loves to hear from her sons but doesn't worry too much about them because she believes they will be taken care of.

While Ian was in Fiji, Americans were evacuated to New Zealand. Marta Uber's parents called concerned, but she said she wasn't worried.

"They'll be watched over," she said.

"And if something happens," John Uber said, "they'll be doing what they are supposed to."

The Ubers have another reason to support their children's decisions to do mission work: John and Marta were converted by missionaries who in 1981 visited them at their home.

John Uber, raised Catholic, decided to convert because the church answered many of the questions he had about families.

Marta Uber, who wasn't religious, also liked the family focus of the religion. Since she was young, she wanted 13 children. She decided to stop after nine.

Now, number four is headed to his mission trip.

Kent said he knows that it is bothering his mother and when the letter came June 24, he decided to read the newspaper first.

Even when he opened the letter, he read it to his mother leaving out where he was going and the language he would speak.

Finally, the tormenting over, he told her.

Kent is headed to Ventura, Calif., on a bicycle mission. He leaves Aug. 10.