Class of 2011 Early Outs?

There are a lot more things that cause a lack of effort than laziness. Changing priorities-some Ensigns start families. Perhaps the largest however is that being a Naval Aviator is not all glamor. It is hard work. Some become disallusioned. And, believe it or not, many just do not adapt to flying. It is not what they thought. To DOR is a step they are unwilling to make. However, minimal effort does become the norm.
 
Camelot?

USNA may not be Camelot, but it would be disingenuous to clump all mids being offered an early out as lazy.

200 from 2010 graduating class, from a BGO. Does anyone have any useful stats to shed light on this policy?

Alumni must have been exposed to RIFs and early outs in the past. Were you there when 1/3 of the aspiring aviators failed flight in 2004 when the passing score was raised to 92% from 80 in 2003
 
Father-in-law brought over his copy of Shipmate. In it under the Class of '56 recapped events at their 55th reunion. Dr Andrew Phillips, Academic Dean, addressed the crew. He told them. "the Class of 2011 had an attrition of 15% with only 3% due to academics and the remaining 12% due to resignations and disciplinary action." Obviously this is prior to graduation, but found it interesting.
Which is fully consistant with recent past classes ... and would in small part perhaps support the "laziness" hypotheses. :confused:

"Oh how I hate to get up in the morning ...":thumbdown::shake:

northstream ... Not sure how you're concluding anyone's suggesting 200 ex communicants becqme such due to laziness. Seems you're jumping to conclusions not merited.
 
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"The vast majority of those who wash out of flight school do so due to lack of effort on their own part."

sorry,guess I thought the thread was about early outs, still, you alumni must have info on the 200 number, the 2004 percentages. This board always has the goods on whats up, I hope someone can shed light this. We parents come begging for info, I hoped some might speak up.
 
USNA may not be Camelot, but it would be disingenuous to clump all mids being offered an early out as lazy.

200 from 2010 graduating class, from a BGO. Does anyone have any useful stats to shed light on this policy?

Alumni must have been exposed to RIFs and early outs in the past. Were you there when 1/3 of the aspiring aviators failed flight in 2004 when the passing score was raised to 92% from 80 in 2003

Why are you looking for absolute answers to a question that really has none. There are 20+ different communities with various failure rates moving people through thier pipelines. Some of the people that washout in a particular pipeline may or may not be offered an alternate path. It all depends on the needs of the Navy/Marines. The individual has no real control.

If you are trying to advise your Mid, you may be wasting your breath. USNA does a great job in exposing Mids to all the various communities and if your Mid feels he has a calling for a particular community then that's their call. It's tough letting go as a parent but by the time they graduate they are adults and make their own choices. Right or wrong.
 
Were you there when 1/3 of the aspiring aviators failed flight in 2004 when the passing score was raised to 92% from 80 in 2003
No one was there because it didn't happen. Neither did the 200 last year. Here is a good read, a NAMI study, which includes 2004 and the aftermath:

http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA494839

In general, more SNAs DOR than all other reasons combined, including failure. Hence, my statement that it is a motivational issue.
 
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Early outs, some of you saw some, knew a buddy, have a good idea how the navy manages the post USNA sailor. Do they still get GI bill? Some claim if you never got a service assignment you are out of luck.

Is this a taboo subject? Many Non military parents on list serve were surprised when they learned grads were being asked to leave when they were still doing ok.

Lack of effort and lettum grow up are answers that smack of disregard for current USNA families and a wake up call for prospective ones.

Thank you for the link, very good read
 
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200

I got this number from a BGO. It may be wrong, a BGO has vaster resources than myself, perhaps more than others here on the board. The link from mongo was great.
 
I got this number from a BGO. It may be wrong, a BGO has vaster resources than myself, perhaps more than others here on the board. The link from mongo was great.
I have been a BGO for 15 years and associated with Naval Aviation in one form or another for almost half a century. There is no way a BGO would have received information such as this via official channels. It is nothing but unsubstantiated rumors. To attrite highly performing SNAs is a total waste of money. To attrite USNA grads is another waste of money and has to be looked at very closely. As of this minute, there are no plans to reduce the current eleven air wings. Read the link. Lack of motivation, in one form or another, is the primary cause for not being winged. It is not disrespect to current USNA families. It is a fact that damn well better be acknowledged. Read the link again.
 
I have read some e-mails from parents whose USNA grads have been offered and /or gotten separations. 1 2010 dad says more than 200 from that class.

It appeared mostly from flight but not exclusively.Does anyone have info on other resent years?

The number of newly commissioned officers who are getting "early outs", as you call it, have been on the rise. The military is currently undergoing a RIF (Reduction In Force). This is not the first time this has happened, nor will it be the last. Military budget cuts combined with the sorry state of the job market has created the situation. Retention is at an unprecedented high (because there are no jobs in the civilian sector); and the influx of newly commissioned officers is excessive. Consequently, the military is looking for reasons to slim the field. One of the ways they are doing this in the flight program is to make the cutoff for acceptable grades very high. They raised it from an 80% to 92%. If you don't make the cutoff, you are given your walking papers and released from any commissioning service obligation.
 
The number of newly commissioned officers who are getting "early outs", as you call it, have been on the rise.
Is there a Navy Reserve that absorbs these early outs? Or is the Service Commitment effectively over? Can an "early out" be called back to Active Duty at some time in the next 5 years (original Active Duty Service Commitment) should the Navy force requirements increase suddenly? Can such early outs be asked to tranfer their Service Obligation over to Army or Air Force Active Duty? Army Reserve? National Guard? Coast Guard Reserve?
 
Maybe. There's a couple people I know of from '10 or '09 who got switched over to being reserve intel/IW officers, and others who were able to go SWO (this is for flight school attrites) depending on the decision of a redesignation board.
The majority that I know of were simply out of luck, and not allowed to stay in the service.
As always, it seems, "needs of the Navy" supersedes everything and sometimes the Navy's needs don't include you.
 
There is an old adage that "No one ever washed out of SWO school and had to go aviation" that the SWOs really do not appreciate. It is degrading to any community to have to take the washouts from another community. This has always been a problem. Since there are probably only 10 or so Academy flight school washouts per year, it is probably not too big a financial burden on the Navy to just go ahead and separate them. I'm sure they would have an eight year total commitment to be served in the inactive reserves.
 
There is an old adage that "No one ever washed out of SWO school and had to go aviation" that the SWOs really do not appreciate. It is degrading to any community to have to take the washouts from another community.

You're definitely right about that. Just like it's demeaning to our enlisted personnel (or "was" as I'm not sure they still do it) to send an honor offendee to the enlisted ranks.

The one exception is for those who are medically DQ'ed after they get to flight school. Happened years ago to the guy who ended up being our flight surgeon (he was already a surgeon, not just an MD) when he went to flight school and still had the commitment so he became a flight surgeon.

Mongo, out of curiosity, what's the main reason people "wash out" of flight school. Aptitude? Not applying oneself?
 
You're definitely right about that. Just like it's demeaning to our enlisted personnel (or "was" as I'm not sure they still do it) to send an honor offendee to the enlisted ranks.
Back about 20+ years ago, the CPOs banded together, screamed bloody murder, got the ear of a sympathetic CNO, and this practice was stopped.


Mongo, out of curiosity, what's the main reason people "wash out" of flight school. Aptitude? Not applying oneself?
The ASVAB which has replaced the old AQT/FAR is very accurate in gauging aptitude. With the aforementioned 2004 cutbacks which were primarily due to decommissioning the S-3, half the two seat F-14s replaced with a single seat F/A-18E, and reducing the pilots/mission in VP, the minimum grade was increased from 3/4 to 4/5. With a higher quality student, attrition remained about the same even with more stringent grading. I think the main reason is attitude. Flight school is hard. Students realize that they just don't want it as much as they thought they did. Aviators are pretty much under a microscope all the time. The anonymity of being one of thirty in a company or one of fifteen in a classroom suddenly becomes one-on-one. Everything one does is critiqued and criticized. This is just an example but many cannot thrive in this environment.
 
I can't say for sure why most people attrite. I can only say why I was attrited in advanced jet after receiving my instrument card. Physical motor skills. God gave me clubs for hands. :shake: Obviously, this was not something that was on the written test. However, as the speed of the aircraft and dynamics changed (from T-34 to T-2 to A-4) so did the difficulty. The Commodore told me when he was letting me know I was at the end of my flying career that he had no doubt that I could land on a nice day in calm seas (which I had done in the T-2) but he had some sincere doubts about it if it was a rocking deck, at night and low on fuel. Most of the persons I know who did not finish were because (1) they did not like it, (2) could think as fast as the plane required or (3) simply did not have the fine motors skills necessary. Life goes on, and I actually learned a lot from becoming an infantry officer, but 30+ years later I still wish I earned my wings.
 
I can't say for sure why most people attrite. I can only say why I was attrited in advanced jet after receiving my instrument card. Physical motor skills. God gave me clubs for hands. :shake: Obviously, this was not something that was on the written test. However, as the speed of the aircraft and dynamics changed (from T-34 to T-2 to A-4) so did the difficulty. The Commodore told me when he was letting me know I was at the end of my flying career that he had no doubt that I could land on a nice day in calm seas (which I had done in the T-2) but he had some sincere doubts about it if it was a rocking deck, at night and low on fuel. Most of the persons I know who did not finish were because (1) they did not like it, (2) could think as fast as the plane required or (3) simply did not have the fine motors skills necessary. Life goes on, and I actually learned a lot from becoming an infantry officer, but 30+ years later I still wish I earned my wings.
140 kt brain huh? Did you go through the expanded flight syllabus primary phase in the T-34C? Prior to that, we selected after our VT-1 12x (only 12 total hops).. Natural ability combined with quick learning was necessary for jet selection. After the expanded syllabus with more flights prior to selection, slow plodders were picked up for jets and the remainder of the pipelines were losing good sticks who just happened to be slow learners but could now qualify for jets. No one was happy. CNATRA claims to have fixed it. Not sure how.Or even if they did.
 
"140 kt brain huh? Did you go through the expanded flight syllabus primary phase in the T-34C? Prior to that, we selected after our VT-1 12x (only 12 total hops).. Natural ability combined with quick learning was necessary for jet selection. After the expanded syllabus with more flights prior to selection, slow plodders were picked up for jets and the remainder of the pipelines were losing good sticks who just happened to be slow learners but could now qualify for jets. No one was happy. CNATRA claims to have fixed it. Not sure how.Or even if they did."

I soloed the T-34 on October 12 and had the choice between jets and helos one one week later. So I believe it was 12 total hops before selection.
The prop pipeline was not even open to Marines then.
 
It seems a disservice to any service academy grad to dismiss their failure in their chosen path as being lazy.After all the effort to get in, plebe summer, plebe year, dark ages, ect.

The mids I have met do not seem lazy to me, they put everything into whatever they do.
I have been waiting until I had a few extra minutes to answer this. No, Midshipmen, as a rule are not lazy. However, they are very adept at not performing extra unnecessary work.

USNA is extremely goal oriented, probably much more so than a civilian college. It starts even before arrival. How many questions on this forum are asked by candidates seeking minimum performance standards, be it CFA, SATs, or physical conditioning required to survive Plebe summer. It continues throughout the Academy. So when they get to Pensacola they are well adapted to doing only whatever is necessary in order to achieve the desired goal. Thusly, Aviation community assignments are largely self-selecting.

Of course, everyone arrives in Pensacola wanting to fly jets. Along the line, on the way to the selection gate, many change their mind. They may not literally have the “stomach” for flying upside down, preferring the straight and level. They may realize, along about the same time as their instructors that they just do not have the motor skills to fly 400 kts. Each community has its own personality. In the training command, constantly exposed to instructors in each of these communities, they may realize that they are a better fit for maritime or helos. A myriad of reasons to change their decision as to what they want to fly and which community of which they want to be a part. Once this decision is reached, the four or five above averages for each flight and the extra hours of preparation necessary to achieve these grades no longer becomes paramount.

Instructors also play a part. The grading system is not totally objective. A student with average to above average social skills and commensurate aviating skills can receive the assistance of instructors. Marginal above average marks will go to those who need it while those who don’t will receive the average marks necessary in order that the instructor not be deemed a “Santa Clause”. Early in the year, those who are in the pipeline before the pools get out of hand, may suddenly find that their aircraft has developed some sort of malfunction, and their hop is graded as a warmup with a complete new reflight the following day.

Of course, the needs of the Navy still apply and occassionally those who thought they were comfortably settled in for a "gentlemanly" 3.0 will have a rude awakening.

Additionally, of course, what they come home to tell family and friends a helo pilot after going off to Pensacola to be the next Tom Cruise might be a completely different story.
 
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