My wife and I were both direct commission, so ROTC is new to us. Our son is applying for the AROTC scholarship and has two schools of choice.
What I don't understand is how the school is part of the equation of whether or not he gets chosen. I thought the scholarship was a national scholarship that was awarded by a central board, and that the scholarship could be transferred to a different school during the 4 year process.
What role does the school play in the initial award of the scholarship? Who actually awards and funds the scholarship?
He will probably be going to his primary choice even if he doesn't get the scholarship and still doing ROTC. We have talked to the PMS at that school and he wasn't very knowledgable about the scholarship program. I guess my biggest question is how can he be awarded a scholarship at one school but not another if both schools have ROTC? It almost seems like its the school making the decision.
You have asked a loaded question and will get many different ideas on how school selection affects the scholarship.
I'll try and answer a few of your questions in short explanations, others will expand I'm sure.
Yes the scholarship is National, the applicant lists 7 schools on the application, I believe at least 3 out of 7 now are required to be Public Schools. The scholarships are awarded by a central board at Cadet Command. The board also assigns the scholarship to one or more of the schools the applicant lists. The schools ROTC battalions have no say other then to check yes or no next to each applicant that lists their school prior to the applicant being reviewed by the board.
If an applicant is awarded a school that they decide not to attend they can apply to have the scholarship transferred, this has it's own set of challenges. Transfers are not a guarantee and it depends on a lot of factors, which can be explained later.
A scholarship from AROTC has no effect on whether a student is accepted to the college.
Cadet Command funds the scholarships, not the schools.
Now the subject that will get the most attention, school selection. Very competitive schools that attract a lot of applicants will be more difficult to obtain a scholarship. Listing all expensive Private and Out of State schools will lessen the applicants chances as well.
During the last year and a half the number of schools Cadet Command offers a scholarship for each applicant has been greatly reduced. A few years ago it was not uncommon that an applicant that received a scholarship was awarded to several, sometimes up to 5 schools. This is not the case anymore, an applicant is lucky to receive a scholarship to one or maybe two schools, and it is not always the applicant's number one school choice. 4 year scholarships are being awarded less and less, the trend seems to be 3 year Advanced Designee Scholarships especially to more expensive schools.
To sum up, Cadet command awards the scholarship to a specific school from the applicants list, even though all the schools listed have AROTC.
Listing a mix of schools that include an In State Public School will help the applicants chances.
The best thing your son can do since he seems to already made his school selection, is to apply for the scholarship, list the school as his number on choice and hope for the best. If he is awarded a scholarship to a different school he can apply for a transfer, a lot of factors will go into whether the transfer is approved.
1) Is the school in he same Brigade
2) Is the school equal or less expensive.
3) Does the ROTC Cadre support the transfer
4) Is there room for a scholarship cadet at the school.
If the answer is yes to all the above then the chances are a little better for a transfer approval.
I hope this helps a little, I'm sure many others will chime in. Look for answers fro
Clarkson Army, and
Marist College, they are current ROO's