The son of one of our neighbors graduated from high school this year. During his senior year, he was very interested in joining either the Air Force Academy or the Naval Acadamy. He received the requesite military academy recommendations from our state representative, but alas he was not accepted to either. One of his parents is a Texas A&M graduate, and A&M is considered an unofficial military academy due the siginificant size of their Corps, the on school ROTC program. But many schools across the country have ROTC programs for which you can receive scholarships from, in exchange for future service, normally as an officer.
Instead of pursuing this route, the neighbors son enlisted in the Navy with a “promise” from the recruiter to get him into an advanced nuclear training program.
I believe the kid is smart enough to get into college. If it had been my son, I would have advised him to consider the college ROTC route. Seems like the route of starting as an enlisted soldier will be longer and more difficult route if a career in the Navy is where he wants to go.
I apparently don’t know the underlying reason for his choices, but from my perspective it sounds like he got some bad advice…maybe from the recruiter.
Don’t believe any promises made by military recruiters; they’re allowed to lie and there are a dozen reasons why that son may not in fact get into the nuke program after all. If he must join, he’s better off doing ROTC-college-officer than enlisting.
Recruiters promise stuff All. The. Time. that they can’t guarantee delivery on. The boy absolutely would be better off going the ROTC route in my opinion.
I can say my brother in law did the same thing (had scholarships lined up to decent school decided to join navy instead) and regretted it. When he got out he had real trouble trying to get his degree while working (nowadays the GI bill covers a small fraction of actually what it costs to go to college), and didn’t get very far. In addition he felt disconnected from his friends who had gone to college while he served, so ended hanging out with his stoner friends (who had spent that period just hanging out and getting stoned)
As with any contract, If it’s not specifically written in the enlistment contract, it doesn’t exist. A recruiter can get prior approval for schooling, etc., from Washington. When I went in, I was guaranteed duty with the Seabees, but was not guaranteed a school.
As for ROTC: it’s a two-edged sword. Yes, they will pay (or help pay) for your college education, but they will get their pound of flesh whether you complete schooling or not. My grandson is a perfect example. He signed onto the ROTC program, which guarantees you a commission (Army, in this case) as a 2nd LT upon completion of your degree program and completion of military training. But in my grandson’s case, he decided that he didn’t want to complete his college degree. The Army said “No problem private Pyle, your induction into the Army will happen in xxx months and you’ll go to basic training immediately thereafter.” He ended up going to the sandbox and spending two years as a grunt, hating every minute of it.
When the Army came looking for me back in the 60s, I was in college AND I was in the then-mandatory ROTC 2-year program that was required for all college men at that school. For some reason, my deferment didn’t mean shit, so I really had no choice other than to join a service that was less likely to try to kill me.
I would indeed worry about any promises made - they could be vaporware (no intention to keep), OR they could simply not work out (no slots in the program or whatever).
That said: having been in the service will open up some opportunities when he leaves in 4 years, as some jobs give preference to veterans, and I don’t know whether the GI Bill is still a thing or not, but that might help with college expenses when he DOES go.
Two of my brothers did the ROTC thing. The oldest, just his freshman year - this was in the later years of the Vietnam War, and by going to college his draft would be postponed (IIRC, he had a low draft number, or whatever it was that indicated he’d be very likely to get called). And if he went the ROTC route, he’d at least be an officer which is presumably somewhat safer.
The conflict ended, and he withdrew from ROTC after a year - he had not been in long enough to have an obligation; IIRC, if he’d gone another 2-3 years, he would have been contractually obligated to follow through.
My second brother actually got a 4-year Navy ROTC scholarship, to a fairly expensive private university. It was a pretty big deal! Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately, as I don’t think he really wanted to become a career officer), the summer between his Junior and Senior years, he needed foot surgery. It was scheduled, but he got called up for his summer “cruise” (that was the word my parents used; it may or may not have involved ships). So the surgery was postponed… and they booted him on medical reasons. Which he and the parents were a bit bummed about - if he’d been called for the later session, he’d have gotten the surgery done beforehand, and it likely would not have been a problem.
In hindsight, I wonder if there wasn’t something more to it than that - you’d think that a temporary, fixable problem would not be a career ender. In any case, my parents paid for his last year of college - which likely was roughly what his expenses would have been for a full course at a public university. They could not have afforded 4 years at the private college.
Anyway: going to college and doing ROTC would seem to give you a bit more leverage; at the very least, you’ll be going in as an officer, with the privileges (and responsibilities) associated. But then you’ve got all the undergrad expenses and possibly debt associated with paying your own freight.
That’s long-winded… but in summary, either approach is quite valid.
When my oldest brother did it, in the 1970s, you were not committed until the third year, I think. He also received no financial benefit during his time; I think that would have started in the third year. It would have taken the form of some kind of allowance to help with expenses. No clue what the rules are nowadays - well worth making sure of them before making any decision (not relevant to the OP’s question, I gather, as the enlistment has already happened).
Especially government jobs, where you get an additional 10 points preference. It really can make the difference between being hired and being an also-ran.
I did Navy ROTC in college as a scholarship student (which paid my tuition), and also went through the Navy Nuclear Power School program as a naval officer. I actually applied to all three ROTC scholarship programs (Air Force, Navy, and Army) in high school and got all three (and of course had to pick one). If you don’t apply in high school, you can also apply for a scholarship once you start college (but they will look at your college transcript In addition to your high school record, and it’s very competitive).
I would say it depends on what the neighbor’s son’s goals are. If his goals are to get a college degree, then I would have recommended the ROTC route. For what it’s worth, though, I think the education and experience that one receives in the U.S. Navy is very good—especially the nuclear power program—and that applies whether you go through the officer nuclear program or the enlisted program. I will say that the washout rate in the enlisted program is much higher than the officer program…and that’s assuming he gets into it in the first place. Recruiters may make promises, but the “needs of the Navy” trumps that.
Also, if his goal is to serve in the U.S. Navy as an officer, it is rather difficult to make the jump from enlisted sailor to commissioned officer in my experience. You basically have to be the best of the best. I once served with a disillusioned nuclear-trained enlisted sailor who already had a college degree when he enlisted and believed the promises of a recruiter who said it be easy to transition into an officer program. It’s not.
If his goal is still to get into the Naval Academy, another route for an enlisted sailor is to get a recommendation and appointment to attend the Naval Academy directly from the fleet. This will sometimes include attendance at the Naval Academy Preparatory School (NAPS). Successful completion of the one-year program leads to an appointment to the Naval Academy. Of course this is all very competitive as well.
Well, I wouldn’t have done either, because I never had any intention of joining the military… but if I had, well, it’s a lot easier for the officers than for the enlisted. Plus the whole college degree thing, which I was going to pursue no matter what.
But if the other alternative being considered is enlisting right on the spot?
A few decades ago I lived next to a Vietnam veteran who was a helicopter gunner. This may be a bullshit story but he was told that if he was drafted he went where they needed him but if he enlisted he would have a choice. After basic they told him what his job would be and he said “they said I would have a choice”. The reply was, “would you prefer the gun on the left side or the right side of the helicopter.”
Best answer by far. Unsurprising given the author.
My own experience is AFROTC & USAF pilot, but otherwise directly parallel’s @robby’s.
What matters is what the kid’s life goals / career goals are. Being a college-educated manager vs being a trained technician, albeit of hi tech stuff. Of course every 17yo is an idiot about big long-term decisions; I certainly was. But the kid probably had some opinion or fantasy or expectation of what he, his lifestyle, and generally what sort of job role (not necessarily occupation) he’d be living at age 30 or 40. I wanna turn wrenches, I wanna code, I wanna be in charge, and I wanna be rich are all plausible ideas for a 17yo to hold. But they’re each quite different ideas with different routes to get there.
If the kid thought he wanted an academy, then he thought he wanted a degree and officer-hood. By enlisting he probably reduced his chances of ever achieving those things by 90 to 95%.
If he doesn’t understand that yet, he will pretty quickly after he’s out of boot camp. Much to his dismay.
I have nothing to add except to say that my nephew went to MIT on a ROTC program, hated it, quit ROTC after his freshman year and had to pay back the scholarship. I guess when you get to the fine print, ROTC isn’t for everyone.
With brother #1, since he was not on a scholarship, I don’t think he received any financial aid, and thus did not need to pay anything back. With brother #2, since he was booted for medical reasons, he did not need to pay any of his scholarship back.
It definitely boils down to making sure you understand all the possibilities and ramifications.
I have a brother who in 1969 received a full-ride ROTC scholarship to any place he wanted to go (my mother said no to Hawaii though). He was very concerned about being drafted during the height of the Vietnam war, so he started at the state’s university and started the ROTC program. Then he got his draft number: well into the 300s, meaning he almost certainly wouldn’t be drafted. After a year and a half of college he left, paid back the scholarship, and never regretted any decisions made.
So my biggest worry wouldn’t be that the recruiter lied to him about being guaranteed advanced nuke training to trick him into joining the Navy. It would be that the recruiter lied to him about how awesome it is to be a nuke to trick him into filling a hard-to-fill quota for the nuke program.
Anyway, for future reference for anyone with family with similar aims, the trick is to apply for an ROTC scholarship concurrent with applying to an academy. Otherwise, by the time you get denied by the Academy, you’re probably too late to apply for an ROTC scholarship for the coming year, and would have to find some other way to cover the cost of tuition for the first year at least—and then there’s no guarantee you’d get picked up for a scholarship later.
A friend of mine got his entire medical school paid for with the deal that he then had to be an Army doctor for six or eight years. He graduated med school in 1992 or so when they were doing the big draw down. They told him they didn’t need him and he was free and clear. No debt!
He always has wanted to be in the military though so he got a commission in the Navy. He was in Hawaii the whole time and became a neurologist. Did twenty plus years and retired as a Captain.