Good questions to ask when visiting AROTC programs?

JMR

5-Year Member
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Jan 7, 2013
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10
Hi everyone,

DS has been awarded a 4 year AROTC scholarship. We are making a final trip to the schools and he plans to meet with the ROO for each battalion. Are there good questions to ask in order to get a 'feel' for the battalion and gauge what type of experience he might have there? We are fairly new to AROTC, but based on reading this forum (especially the post the other day re: the description of an FTX, which I'm assuming is field training exercise??) and visiting the Facebook pages for the battalions it seems like each has its own personality, strengths/weaknesses, activities, how active they are on campus, etc.

We understand the importance of being happy at the school outside of ROTC, but as DS is interested in making the most of out his ROTC experience, we would appreciate thoughts on good questions to ask during the visit.

Thank you in advance.
 
Hi everyone,

DS has been awarded a 4 year AROTC scholarship. We are making a final trip to the schools and he plans to meet with the ROO for each battalion. Are there good questions to ask in order to get a 'feel' for the battalion and gauge what type of experience he might have there? We are fairly new to AROTC, but based on reading this forum (especially the post the other day re: the description of an FTX, which I'm assuming is field training exercise??) and visiting the Facebook pages for the battalions it seems like each has its own personality, strengths/weaknesses, activities, how active they are on campus, etc.

We understand the importance of being happy at the school outside of ROTC, but as DS is interested in making the most of out his ROTC experience, we would appreciate thoughts on good questions to ask during the visit.

Thank you in advance.

Why not ask if the ROO could arrange for him to have breakfast or lunch with a couple of MS2s or MS3s so that they could give him a feel for the ROTC life and school experience? MS4s may be too busy or winding down as they prepare for commissioning and their respective BOLCs.

It may be too early for your son to have formulated goals, i.e., active duty, branch choices, etc., but he should be curious about how to achieve success as a cadet and how to balance ROTC and school life.
 
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I agree with EDelahanty. My DS happened to visit on drill day and got to spend time with the Marine Options (who were learning how to disassemble and clean service weapons - what a great day to visit!). He then went to classes with some of the midshipmen. That is where you get the strait scoop.

One caution: Each unit has its own personality and culture, traditions and history. But a lot of this is determined by the staff which rotates over time. My DS would be the first to point out the drastic differences between his freshman year to his senior year after rotation of the professional, active duty staff. Its important to realize that what you see in the spring of 2015 may not be what you see by the time your graduate.
 
I would also ask what the commissioning rate is for cadets, what types of events/programs the cadets are involved with on campus, how the cadets perform at regional/national level competitions, how many non-scholarship students end up getting scholarships later (even though your DS has one, it can tell a lot of the strength of the program), how many cadets get selected for additional summer training (CTLT, Airborne school, etc. I would also talk to many non-ROTC students to get a feel with how ROTC is perceived on campus. I was surprised at the difference in community support of ROTC there was on some campuses vs. others. Some campus have regular military protestors near ROTC, even! Good luck in the final decision making process.
 
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