Is it to late to transfer a 3 year scholarship

sjbd94

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The school I got my scholarship to really disappointed me with its orientation and i was already iffy about going there and honestly i am almost certain now I would not be happy going there. But i am going to do if i cant transfer my ROTC scholarship for at least the fall semester if that is the case. I have a VERY STRONG DESIRE to do ROTC. It is the sole reason I am even going away to college as I got in to the 3rd or some argue second hardest school in my state to get into which is like 15mins from my house and that is were i would love to go but they dont have ROTC so my desire to become an army officer is what is driving me to go away for college. i read the deadline is June first for fall semester somewhere but since I wouldn't be receiving scholarship money my first year does this deadline, which i am not even sure is true, apply? Thank you for your time!
 
anyone have any idea who i could call and ask? should I call the ROTC department at the school I would want to transfer it too?
 
anyone have any idea who i could call and ask? should I call the ROTC department at the school I would want to transfer it too?

That would be a good place to start. If they're full then the issue becomes moot. If they would pull for you that could be a big help and they could tell you how to proceed (hopefully). Of course it may also be moot because of deadlines, but no one here can give you a definitive answer on that. Stranger things have happened.
 
You've been rasslin with less than optimal choices for a number of months. Some have offered advice, and I thought that of Clarkson back in April was particularly insightful. However, your most recent questions make it unclear about what exactly you may have done to improve your situation: specifically, whether you already tried to transfer and failed or you simply determined to make a go of it at the 3 year ROTC scholarship school (let's call it ECU).

At this point, however, the clock is getting ready to lap you. Why not grit your teeth and kick butt academically and in your ROTC unit at ECU for a year? I recall you mentioning that you're a runner: why not go out for cross country. Build a strong record, and it will be much easier to transfer to the University of North Panacea. If you find the prospect of ECU to be loathsome, imagine how you'll feel at some of the dismal locales where the Army might post you (with no transfer option).

As far as the party environment, which you find unappealing, chances are ROTC will have a higher proportion of serious-minded people with whom you can associate and socialize. You should be aware though that even ROTC units contain a number of "high-spirited" people.

____________________________________________________________

The thought of what America would be like if the Classics had a wide circulation troubles my sleep. E. Pound.
 
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You've been rasslin with less than optimal choices for a number of months. Some have offered advice, and I thought that of Clarkson back in April was particularly insightful. However, your most recent questions make it unclear about what exactly you may have done to improve your situation: specifically, whether you already tried to transfer and failed or you simply determined to make a go of it at the 3 year ROTC scholarship school (let's call it ECU).

At this point, however, the clock is getting ready to lap you. Why not grit your teeth and kick butt academically and in your ROTC unit at ECU for a year? I recall you mentioning that you're a runner: why not go out for cross country. Build a strong record, and it will be much easier to transfer to the University of North Panacea. If you find the prospect of ECU to be loathsome, imagine how you'll feel at some of the dismal locales where the Army might post you (with no transfer option).

As far as the party environment, which you find unappealing, chances are ROTC will have a higher proportion of serious-minded people with whom you can associate and socialize. You should be aware though that even ROTC units contain a number of "high-spirited" people.

After reviewing previous posts I'd have to agree with EDelhanty here, especially since you seem to have contacted the ROOs previously and took no action. I don't think they're going to be too impressed. I took a quick look at the NC colleges with AROTC and unless you're at some smaller remote affiliate, they're all good schools. Do they all have a different vibe? Sure. But the "college experience" at all of them will still be rather similar.

And if partying is the issue, there is no reason why you have to go out and party. I'm not saying my kid doesn't go out and have a good time but he is no wild partier either. He uses Friday evenings to do SEAL workouts and works out Saturday evenings as well. He does go out, but after the workouts, showering, etc etc. It sure cuts down on the "wild" in "wild party". And he is also usually with other midshipmen which I'm sure cuts it down even more. I suspect you're selling the 3 year school short and if you gave it a chance you'd be just fine there. Of course it's harder to give advice without knowing what the school is and what your issues with it are.
 
The school I got my scholarship to really disappointed me with its orientation and i was already iffy about going there and honestly i am almost certain now I would not be happy going there. But i am going to do if i cant transfer my ROTC scholarship for at least the fall semester if that is the case. I have a VERY STRONG DESIRE to do ROTC. It is the sole reason I am even going away to college as I got in to the 3rd or some argue second hardest school in my state to get into which is like 15mins from my house and that is were i would love to go but they dont have ROTC so my desire to become an army officer is what is driving me to go away for college. i read the deadline is June first for fall semester somewhere but since I wouldn't be receiving scholarship money my first year does this deadline, which i am not even sure is true, apply? Thank you for your time!

I can't imagine what you would have been exposed to at freshman orientation (short of hot and cold running cockroaches, rats, and mold in the dorms) that could have changed your mind about a school. Really, these events are about introducing the incoming students to "how do I do the things I need to do" (make advisor appointments, use the class scheduling software, etc.). Yes, you are going to meet the students you will actually be attending class with and they may be unimpressive when compared to what you expected to meet at the "3rd or some argue second hardest school in my state", but look at it this way, you are there to learn. You don't learn from the student sitting next to you, you learn from the professor, the readings, office hours, etc. In fact, if you are truly one of the top students, you will be more likely to be offered research opportunities and other honors that you wouldn't get at the "harder" school where you would be just another "average" student.

Given that you've miscalculated your experience at this school, what makes you think you haven't miscalculated the other school's experience (unless you spied on their orientation while they weren't looking)?

Bottom line is that the grass isn't necessarily greener on the other side; You can always second guess a good decision and end up dissatisfied. Get used to things not being as advertised - The Army has plenty of those situations waiting for you and once you've contracted, the Army holds ALL of the cards - so get used to making the best of the situation you are in.

You will need to understand this if you are going to be successful in life.
 
goaliedad said:
Given that you've miscalculated your experience at this school, what makes you think you haven't miscalculated the other school's experience (unless you spied on their orientation while they weren't looking)?

Bottom line is that the grass isn't necessarily greener on the other side; You can always second guess a good decision and end up dissatisfied. Get used to things not being as advertised - The Army has plenty of those situations waiting for you and once you've contracted, the Army holds ALL of the cards - so get used to making the best of the situation you are in.

You will need to understand this if you are going to be successful in life.

Excellent advice.

I might be missing this somewhere, somehow, but the last I have experienced with my kids is ROTC transfer is really not the issue right now, transferring to your dream school is a player now, even if it did have ROTC.

Most colleges, unless you paid the deposit fee for both, would not accept you as an incoming FULL TIME freshman at this late date. Hence, this conversation is truly moot! You made your bed from an academic position, ROTC was just the side issue.

We all understand your stress, but we also have the luxury from not only looking the outside in, but also from experience.

One thing everyone who has ever attended college will tell you, that it is just like HS. Cliques are made very quickly, and the longer you wait to transfer the harder it will be to say goodbye AND to find new friends at the next college. A semester or yr from now, these kids have already bonded over orientation, moving into dorms, eating dinner together, going to FB games, etc. It is even harder since many colleges no longer guarantee housing after freshman yr. If that is the case, where will you live? You will have to move in with strangers. Even if the school has housing, think about it...the current students will dorm together, and you will be left as the fill in. You will be the new kid on the block, and that grass which was so green now turns out to be green because it was just weeds.

As goaliedad stated if this is a problem, just wait until you commission into the Army. They may give you options of where you will be posted, but the last word is theirs, not yours. Unlike college where you can say "I am outta here" if you don't like it, you can't when you are AD. That is why we all pound into every candidate/cadet/mid poster SERVICE BEFORE SELF. It isn't just a line, it is a way of life for the military.

I am not inferring or implying you don't get that, I am saying to accept it as fact. Two different things.

A pet peeve for many, including and especially the military ties back to that adage. When they give a date, it is not a suggestion date with wiggle room, it is basically an order. The fact that you missed the date by a month, does not look good upon your character as a future officer in the military. Yes, you are 18, but so are thousands of other cadets that followed the directions set forth upon receiving a scholarship.

I guarantee you there are many attending their non-dream college, but decided to do so because they understood this is only 4 yrs at tops (maybe a yr if they transfer), and their AD life would be much longer than their college yrs.

Finally, if I am correct you are going to ECU. ECU has a phenomenal AROTC program. I think you are making a snap judgement on the college without spending anytime with the unit. Due to ROTC you will spend a lot of waking hours at the unit, especially as yrs pass and you gain more responsibility. It is highly likely that your close friends in 4 yrs from now are not the people you met or will meet in your dorm this yr., but the ones that understand how different the life of a ROTC student at ECU is compared to the ECU student.

Lesson to candidates of 2017, VISIT the unit! If you don't you can find yourself in this scenario. If you visit the school, not thrilled with the campus, but can deal with it, and LOVE the unit, the school becomes a non-issue.

Vise a verse. Love the school, hate the unit, the school becomes a non-issue there too.

Good luck.

PS, I know ECU, since before moving to VA, ECU was considered down the road from where we lived, a ton of HS grads went there. DS's GF attends ECU. I agree from a campus perspective it is more of a city with a college there, and not a college in a city feel. Much different than Appalachian, Elon, or UNCCH since it feels more like a commuter college, but really isn't once you are there.
 
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Well thanks for the advice guys. I cant change schools until Spring anyway. I mean i'll probably go to the school where my ROTC scholarship is at for the fall and see how I feel when the semester ends. Just a quick question, sorry if its dumb, but I couldn't wait till spring to enroll in ROTC if I was on a 3 year scholarship could I?
 
Well thanks for the advice guys. I cant change schools until Spring anyway. I mean i'll probably go to the school where my ROTC scholarship is at for the fall and see how I feel when the semester ends. Just a quick question, sorry if its dumb, but I couldn't wait till spring to enroll in ROTC if I was on a 3 year scholarship could I?

A 3-year AD scholarship requires successful completion of the full MS1 program from day 1. It is only good at the school to which it is awarded. If you walk away from your current school, you walk away from the scholarship and would be a walk-on at your next school competing with the other walk-ons already in that unit.

If you choose this route, note that cadre will talk about your experience at the first school. It is a very small world in ROTC. Cadre at the local university here know cadre at my daughter's school 900 miles away.

My best advice is to try to make the most of the opportunity in front of you and pay no attention to what MIGHT be better elsewhere. You life is what YOU make of it - not what those around you make of it.
 
+1 to goaliedad's advice.

You can transfer, but be prepared to never get a scholarship at the other college. The only person forcing you to attend that college is you! Trust me, I get it from a financial perspective, but it is still your choice to make.

I mean this with kindness, but understand in this current environment (DOD budget), there maybe posters seeing your position as whining. Scholarships are not the majority, they are the minority, and many kids are not going to their dream college either for the exact same reason, but instead they are going to their B or C college with student loans. They aren't going to cry tears of pity for you because the Army is making you got to your B college and not only paying tuition, but books, and a stipend too for 3 out of the 4 yrs.

My advice, don't complain! Don't give the WOA is me story of how you didn't want to be there in the 1st place, but because the only way you could use the scholarship was to attend this school. That will be the fastest way to become persona non grata.

I have to ask at this point, is it really about the school, or is it more about the Army. If I recall you wanted the AFA, than the Navy. Did you change branch desires because of the AD careers offered, or did you decide to go Army because they offered a scholarship? If it is the latter, think very long and hard about the path you are about to embark on, because college life is 30 weeks a yr, 15-18 hrs a week for 4 yrs where you want to live. ADA is 52 weeks a yr, 40 hrs on a good week for 4+ yrs. wherever they send you, whenever they send you...can you say Camp Red Cloud SKorea, Ft. Rich AK, Ft Bliss TX, Ft. Polk LA? Two different worlds and believe me, the ones that are miserable AD are the ones that didn't read the fine print! Read the fine print...you serve at the luxury of the Army, they will try to meet your requests regarding career fields and posts, but in the end of the day, you will go where they tell you to go. You will do what they tell you to do and when to do it. Your desires are secondary, just like the scholarship situation.

Take the time now and ask if you are willing to accept that as fact 4 yrs from now.
 
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what im considering in regards to transfer is go to the college where my current scholarship is at for the first fall semester and then apply for a transfer while enrolled in ROTC to the school I got into for the Spring. Honestly I'm not a 100% what i want to do in regards to the army and everything, but I'll never know if I dont give it a try.
 
what im considering in regards to transfer is go to the college where my current scholarship is at for the first fall semester and then apply for a transfer while enrolled in ROTC to the school I got into for the Spring. Honestly I'm not a 100% what i want to do in regards to the army and everything, but I'll never know if I dont give it a try.

I'm not quite sure you understand the whole process here.

The scholarship you were awarded is a 3 year Advanced Designee, this means that you need to be fully enrolled in ROTC for your freshman year at the school the scholarship was awarded to. During this time you will need to pass your APFT, keep your grades up and participate fully in all ROTC activities and training. At the end of the year the PMS will need to validated your scholarship based on your performance during your freshman year. Remember your scholarship has not kicked in yet. The time has passed for you to transfer this scholarship, the options are not complicated, either go to the school with the scholarship or go to a different school and lose the scholarship, there is no gray area. The other option is go to the school that is close to you that does not have ROTC and just let the idea of the military go for now. This is not rocket science.

During your freshman year if you still want to transfer schools you will need to apply for a transfer to the new school, make sure you talk to the school you think you want to transfer, it's not always as easy as you might think. If you decide to transfer you will probably lose the scholarship offer from the Army. When you get to the new school you would join the battalion as a non scholarship cadet, there would still be no obligation at this point to the Army. At this point you would be competing with all the other nn scholarship cadets for a contract that you would sign starting your junior year, contracts are not a guarantee by any means, the other cadets at your new school will have been with the program for 2 years, you will only be there 1 year, they will have an advantage. If you do not get offered a contract you are done, you cannot continue with ROTC.

Now, if you decide to stay at the 1st college and start your sophomore year, accept the scholarship, and sign the contract, the Army now owns you. If you drop out of ROTC after that point you will have to either payback the money you have received or be forced to enlist in the regular Army, the choice is not yours.

Does the school you are looking to transfer have ROTC, have you even talked to them about whether you could transfer, have you talked to the school to find out all the issues surrounding transferring as a sophomore.

At some point you need to make a decision and stick with it, at least a decision on how you are going to start. Based on how you have been making decisions or rather on how you have been unable to make a decision regarding school and ROTC it may be best to just scrap the idea, go to the school you want to go to and re-think your military options when you get close to graduation. Once in ROTC and later in the actual Army you will never have the luxury of time to make a decision on anything, not the kind of time you are taking to make this decision. You take this amount of time and ask these questions while in the Army, they will laugh you out of the office and just send you where they want.

Nobody hear can tell you what to do, or what is best for you, only you know those answers. It's time to step up, make a decision, and move on.
 
In other words, you want to transfer the scholarship mid-yr., even though you missed the June cut off date for FY 13?

You will walk in day 1 at your college and tell them I intend to leave by Jan. How do you think that is going to play out? Be realistic, not pie in the sky, to transfer in Jan., you need to have paperwork in by Oct., basically 6-8 weeks after you become an MSI. Why should they support you?

AROTC scholarship is not like AFROTC. AROTC is tied to the cadet AND the school. Leaving the school does not mean you can take the scholarship with you.

Re-read the really small fine print on the paperwork.

We are not trying to come down hard on you, we are trying to make you get the way it works. The unit you are wanting to transfer to with the scholarship, in all likelihood has no scholarship availability since that June 1st date was to move around cadets like you. Ask Marist and Clarkson, they have seen scholarships drop a lot in the past few yrs. YOU NEED TO UNDERSTAND SCHOLARSHIPS ARE NOT THE NORM, THEY ARE THE RARITY IN TODAY'S MILITARY BUDGET. Rare as in maybe 20% are on scholarship. Odds of getting a scholarship as a walk on mid-yr is not a bet I think anyone would take here unless the ROI is 1000 to 1, maybe 500 to 1 you will get some takers, but def. not 10 to 1 or 5 to 1 odds.

I am inclined to agree with Jcleppe, it maybe best right now to go to your dream college and revisit the military issue in a yr from now, or even later after graduation. However, I have a sneaky suspicion that you feel you cannot do this since the scholarship is a financial situation...no scholarship = loans or no school.

Do not attend a college on ROTC scholarship because it will pay for your education. The fastest way to lose a scholarship is to hate the school and fail out.
 
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the deadline i saw is December first for the spring of 2013. I would of course not go in the the attitude of im here and ready to get out first day. I mean that would be dumb and I probably wouldn't do well. But i'll email the school i would potentially like to transfer to, to see if it could work out.
 
I would listen to Jcleppe. He laid it out for you about as plain as it can be. Make a decision and don't look back, unless you are just toying with us.
 
Packer, the problem is Jcleppe and others have laid this out in many ways, but no offense to sjbd, they are unwilling to believe/accept this idea.

:bang::bang::bang::bang: Is now where I am at.
 
the deadline i saw is December first for the spring of 2013. I would of course not go in the the attitude of im here and ready to get out first day. I mean that would be dumb and I probably wouldn't do well. But i'll email the school i would potentially like to transfer to, to see if it could work out.

“Sincerity - if you can fake that, you've got it made.”
― George Burns
 
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