Hi. I have some quick questions about the ROTC commissioning. I have a friend that was in NROTC that did not have a scholarship and after his second year, everyone that did not have a scholarship was pretty much kicked out. I have another friend that got a scholarship from AROTC but he says that a small percentage of people that actually commission are on scholarships. My question is how likely are you to commission with NROTC, AFROTC and AROTC if you do not have a scholarship? Thanks
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Commissioning without Scholarship?
- Thread starter 34KING18
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AlphaAlphaSigma
5-Year Member
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- Dec 7, 2013
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Each and every branch has a way for scholarships and non-scholarships to commission. In NROTC non-scholarship midshipmen had to have an Advanced Standing or earn a scholarship in order to progress into the upper half of ROTC. In recent years advanced standing has been minimal allegedly down to about 50 slots for the entire nation! Many units had to kick out a lot of the non-scholarship midshipmen as they did not earn an advanced standing. In AFROTC (My branch) the majority of AFROTC cadets and commissionees are non-scholarship. Both non-scholarship and scholarship cadets have to compete for a slot to get into the upper half of ROTC. If you are a non-scholarship and fail to get a slot you may re-compete the following year but if you are a scholarship cadet and fail to get a slot you will be kicked out. In AROTC a scholarship cadet has been contracted thus guarantees them a commissioning slot as long as they follow the proper channels and don't screw up. An AROTC unit has a limited number of contracts they can give out and with scholarship cadets already having contracts they can only give out the remainder to the non-scholarship cadets. From what I see NROTC has the most percentage scholarship commissionees, AROTC has the second most, and AFROTC has the least. On the other hand, the same order goes in the amount of scholarships they would provide for non-scholarship cadets.
NROTC prefers (at least prior to budget cuts they preferred) to have all midshipmen on scholarship. They use advanced standing to help cover attrition and when they don't have enough whom they think qualify for scholarship (including the calculus and physics requirements). The numbers vary year by year according to the needs of the navy to fill their remaining slots allocated for ROTC commissioning. The numbers for the incoming senior class of '16 are as follows: in 2012 they gave 950 4-year scholarships with the goal of commissioning 725 officers. In 2014, they added 64 side load scholarships to the class of '16 out of 220 students who were nominated for side load scholarships. They also gave 127 offers of advanced standing as they had a large number of candidates. The number of advanced standing offers that year was high. For other recent years, the numbers have been far lower: 2012 - 20 advanced standing offers made out of 58 students who applied; 2013 - 20 advanced standing offers made out of 20 students who applied; 2015 - 18 advanced standing offers made out of ?? students who applied.