Difficulty of Obtaining 4-year?

dlee96

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Apr 11, 2012
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How hard would it be to be granted a 4-year ROTC scholarship? I mean, if you applied to the service academies and are found competitive/admissible, would that automatically give you a 4-year scholarship?
 
How hard would it be to be granted a 4-year ROTC scholarship? I mean, if you applied to the service academies and are found competitive/admissible, would that automatically give you a 4-year scholarship?

No
 
How hard would it be to be granted a 4-year ROTC scholarship? I mean, if you applied to the service academies and are found competitive/admissible, would that automatically give you a 4-year scholarship?

All ROTC scholarships are very competitive now. And there us no automatic anything. Most folks doing ROTC are doing it without the scholarship.
 
+1 to both posts, but also some ROTC scholarships are more difficult to get than others.

99% of posters here will tell you NROTC is the hardest scholarship to receive. It is not only tied to the college, but the major too. 85% of their scholarships go to STEM majors.

AROTC scholarships are tied to the college, but not as hard to the intended major.

AFROTC is not tied to the college, but 80% go to STEM.

Each branch is different.

Before you commit to a scholarship or an SA please take the time to understand that you will be @27 on a good day when you can leave. That is a decade from now.

Investigate what each branch has to offer you in the AD world. You can take loans like the majority of college students do to pay for college. The difference between you on scholarship and the college student on loans? Once they graduate they can work in whatever career field they want, live wherever they want, move every 6 months if they want. That is not a military members life, those options went out the window when they contracted.

OBTW, they can also fail a class or graduate late without the loans being revoked as long as the college allows them to stay. ROTC scholarship world you have a better chance of winning 10K on a scratch off lottery ticket in this current economic environment than them keeping you below the ROTC min. cgpa
 
How hard would it be to be granted a 4-year ROTC scholarship? I mean, if you applied to the service academies and are found competitive/admissible, would that automatically give you a 4-year scholarship?

If the service academies list you as fully qualified, then you would be fully qualified for ROTC and eligible to compete for an ROTC Scholarship.

I would consider getting accepted to a service academy to be more difficult that getting an ROTC Scholarship, but being listed as qualified not selected (QNS) by the service academies does not give you an advantage in the scholarship selection process.
 
Marist,

I think most were responding to this part of the post:
I mean, if you applied to the service academies and are found competitive/admissible, would that automatically give you a 4-year scholarship?

For AFROTC that would be a NO, and a resounding NO at that, because to be deemed competitive for the AFA you need a 24 ACT V or 490 CR SAT. AFROTC scholarship recipients typically hit the 1250 marker (median), and on top of that the AFA superscores, whereas AFROTC takes best sitting.

I think the OP had a fallacy that ROTC scholarships are the runner up prize.

I cannot speak for any other branch, and since the OP has not alluded to which ROTC branch, I am assuming AF is on the table.

AFROTCHQ, and their boards do not know if any candidate is applying to the AFA. AFROTCHQ does not talk to AFA regarding candidates, nor does the AFA talk to AFROTC re: candidates and scholarships.

dlee96,

One other thing you will learn from this site is that prep school for SA's are not runner-up options either.

Prep exist because the candidate typically is ideal, except somewhere in their PAR they need help. I don't know of a prepster that is there because their CFA scores were low, I know a ton that their SAT/ACT gave them this opportunity. A 1300 SAT is not the ideal candidate for prep.

Also understand that the system is different between the SA and ROTC.

AFROTC cuts off at the end of your jr yr n HS, AFA allows SR yr. 200 hrs volunteering with Habitat for Humanity from July to Sept will be an EC for AFA, not for AFROTC.

ROTC is national. They don't care if you are from Terre Haute or San Diego regarding your WCS. They are looking at stats and facts...academics, PFA, majors and college choices.

SAs are geo-centric first. If you are from Terre Haute you will not be placed at first against a San Diego candidate. Maybe later on, when it comes to the National List.

Finally be prepared to accept that many candidates are like you. Applying to every SA and for every ROTC scholarship, however, not every ROTC candidate will apply to every SA.
 
SA-ROTC

FWIW, my DS was 3 q'd with a nomination and got the TWE from USNA 4/5, applied for NROTC tier III and was denied 3/15. No such thing as a sure thing. You may however want to make sure you play every hand and apply for all SAs and all ROTC branches, (Navy or Marine option, not both) that may increase your chances. DS regrets not applying for AROTC and is enrolled with HOYA Battalion at G'town in the hope of earning a scholarship while attending AU. Turns out AROTC is a better fit for a non-STEM student.
 
FWIW, my DS was 3 q'd with a nomination and got the TWE from USNA 4/5, applied for NROTC tier III and was denied 3/15. No such thing as a sure thing. You may however want to make sure you play every hand and apply for all SAs and all ROTC branches, (Navy or Marine option, not both) that may increase your chances. DS regrets not applying for AROTC and is enrolled with HOYA Battalion at G'town in the hope of earning a scholarship while attending AU. Turns out AROTC is a better fit for a non-STEM student.

AROTC is a lot better for non-STEM majors, however STEM majors do get point advantages when it comes to branching into army specialities. I guess it was the biggest AAR complaint from cadets over the years because of the difficulty gap between say a communications and bioengineering major.
 
AROTC is a lot better for non-STEM majors, however STEM majors do get point advantages when it comes to branching into army specialities. I guess it was the biggest AAR complaint from cadets over the years because of the difficulty gap between say a communications and bioengineering major.

Agree, AROTC up until this year didn't place much more emphasis on STEM vs. non-STEM in the scholarship award committee. I was told in July 2011 that the AROTC is in fact starting to lean toward favoring STEM, but not to the Extent that NROTC and AFROTC do.

The bonus point on the OMS (1 pt. Engineering, 0.5 points for other STEM) is a small correction to what is ordinarily (on average, across all colleges and Universities) a .3 - .35 point cumulative GPA delta between STEM and non-STEM (which is 3 - 3.5 OMS points) classes, but at least it is a start!
 
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