Plan B Involves an ROTC Scholarship

A

ArmyMom11

5-Year Member
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Nov 14, 2015
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Hello.

My son just found out yesterday that he received an appointment to West Point. Of course, he is excited. He also received the four-year Army ROTC scholarship a few months ago which he accepted. The school he planned to attend with that scholarship is about $50,000 a year so that scholarship is important!

He will email the school and the ROTC liaison but what do other people recommend? We were just getting ready to send in the deposit to hold his spot at the school. He also has a good scholarship offer from the school itself so he was going to use that to pay room/board and that sort of thing.

Thank you for any and all advice. This is just such an exciting time.
 
Great question. IMHO, sending the deposit is cheap insurance. Why do you need insurance? Most civilian universities and ROTCs report in mid to late August. That is 6 to 8 weeks of more healing from an injury that would keep you from reporting to USMA in June.

IMHO you should also hold on to the AROTC scholarship until he reports to USMA. He is not keeping it from someone, he has earned that 4 year scholarship. When he reports for BCT, the Army will cancel the AROTC scholarship. You can let the school know in August after he has almost completed BCT.

Use the search tool in the upper right corner of the page. There are other great threads on this topic.
 
Sometimes you almost have to think about a Plan C, too. As Falcon A mentioned, when your son reports on R-Day, his ROTC scholarship is nullified. If he is hurt during BCT and has to leave, then he will NOT be able to go back to use the ROTC Scholarship at plan B. If he has enough merit scholarship/financial aid from Plan B school and you can afford it without the ROTC scholarship, then that is fine. If he is hurt at BCT, then the cadets are generally told that they will be given an LOA for the next year, but they would still need a nomination for the appointment. If that were to happen, would your son take the year off or want to go to college during that year? Those are the things you have to think about.
 
My son was hurt during cadet basic training (CBT) at needed to take a year's medical leave of absence (MLOA). He was told that they would hold a spot for him in the next year's class. He simply had to heal up from his injury and pass the APFT. He did not have to get another nomination for an appointment. Had he been injured *before* CBT, then he would have had to reapply all over again and also gain a nomination.

He was not required to take any college classes during his year-long MLOA, but we chose for him to take a few classes lest he forget everything. :)
The fact that we were paying out of pocket for these classes and the fact that the credits would not transfer to his service academy played a role in deciding how many classes he would take at our local county college.

The rules regarding this may vary from one service academy to another. This was our experience.
 
Back in the stone age, my sons declined their 4 year free rides the same day they accepted their USAFA appointments.

We paid deposits to their civilian schools, one of which kindly returned it after BCT and offered to keep a slot open for him for the next year should he decide USAFA was not for him. The other kept our deposit and essentially said "Good Riddance." Plans B make for good planning.
 
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