Pima
10-Year Member
- Joined
- Nov 28, 2007
- Messages
- 13,900
I am not a gambling person, but there is no way I would say to my kid to bank on that option at all. I would say to them that the reality is you have @1% of that occurring at all.
Let's say they go USMA. but want to go ADAF. The Army has to agree to release them, AND the AF has to agree to pick them up. Even you are stating there are 8-10 in the queue, let's say 5 get picked up. Do the math. Class of 2021 will start with @1100+ and will commission @900, it is less than 1% on a good day.
If you want to serve and are okay serving in any branch, than yes do it by all means. However, if you are like my DS than don't. Go the ROTC or OTS route. As I stated before my DS was an AF brat, but his Dad was an exception to the rule for most officers. He flew the F15E so DS saw the fighter word. Bullet was an ALO, not the USAFA ALO type like Christcorp and Stealth, but the guy that jumped in with the 82nd Airborne to call in AF air strikes. He did a 2 yr tour as an ALO, so we lived the Army lifestyle...trust me the cliches of the AF being the corporate branch is true. Same as the cliche if the Army wanted you have a spouse they would have assigned you one.
~ I was married to Bullet for 5 yrs before he jumped out of perfectly good airplanes as an ALO with the Army. We were college sweethearts and dated throughout his ROTC years. (pinned on his butter bars). I thought I knew every acronym there was to know. I understood what red air and blue air was. I knew what he meant when he said that day he was doing a 4 v4 double turn. Heck, I even knew what they meant by the term pickle...it means your wife is in labor. However, we get to Bragg, and at 5:00 a.m.the morning after we arrived I feel him kiss me goodbye and say I am going to PT and I will be back in a few hours. Groggy I just say I love you and close my eyes to go back to sleep. 30 seconds later my mind takes over and does an acronym search...what is PT? Can't figure it out at all which meant now I am wide awake and waiting to find out what the heck that term meant!
~~ Just saying for the AF they don't do mandatory PT as a squadron. If they do, it is called golfing!
It is a different world and when you have to live it 24/7/365 for 5 years I will never waiver from my statement that an SA education just because it is an SA is not wise in my decision especially if you have ROTC and plan B scholarships in hand. You can stay at your school, and transfer from AFROTC to NROTC or AROTC with maybe the only hardship is losing your ROTC scholarship. You will still commission and nobody in the AD world cares about whether or not you are an SA grad, ROTC or OTS. They care about how you do your job.
OBTW, for those that say spread the wealth from an MOC nomination perspective, here is again why I disagree.
1. My DS like every other candidate had to list on his nomination packet what SAs he was requesting a nomination for. He put only 1. USAFA. Line 2 and 3 were left empty. He received all 3 MOC nominations.
~ Nobody held it against him that he did not want to go any other SA. During his MOC interviews they asked him point blank why he did not ask for any other nomination. He answered honestly...because even if I do not get a nomination to USAFA, I will than move onto plan B, ROTC. It was AF and AF only
~ By having only USAFA and not gaming the system, he got 3 more chances before he had to hit the national pool. Had he gamed it and put USAFA #1 on Cong. slate, USNA #1 on Sen A slate. and USMA on Sen B slate. He would have had only 1 slate to win that appointment for USAFA before hitting the pool.
I get it, it was a risk, but to him he wanted the option of 3 slates.
2. Our close friends DS came from a competitive state where they shared the wealth among the MoCs. IOWS, you get 1 nom., and 1 nom only. He decided that he wanted to follow in his Dad's footsteps and fly fighters, but instead of for the AF he wanted Navy. He only applied to USAFA and USNA. 2 of the 3 he placed USNA as number 1. The last he placed USAFA. Lo and behold he gets a principal, but to USAFA and no nom to USNA. His folks had the smarts to call that MoC and see if they would switch it to USNA. The staff said give us a few days to see if we can. Well the staff called the principal for USNA and she said, YES switch because USAFA was her 1st choice, not USNA. They both commissioned in 2012. He is an F18 pilot now.
~ The point is had she said no, he would have never gone to his number 1 SA choice.
Beware when you suggest to any poster here without knowing their state and if their MoCs talk you might be forcing their hand into a branch that they do not want to serve in, but may go down that road just say they are going to an SA.
My 0.01754 cents and with $2.07 more you can get a small coffee from Starbucks.
Let's say they go USMA. but want to go ADAF. The Army has to agree to release them, AND the AF has to agree to pick them up. Even you are stating there are 8-10 in the queue, let's say 5 get picked up. Do the math. Class of 2021 will start with @1100+ and will commission @900, it is less than 1% on a good day.
If you want to serve and are okay serving in any branch, than yes do it by all means. However, if you are like my DS than don't. Go the ROTC or OTS route. As I stated before my DS was an AF brat, but his Dad was an exception to the rule for most officers. He flew the F15E so DS saw the fighter word. Bullet was an ALO, not the USAFA ALO type like Christcorp and Stealth, but the guy that jumped in with the 82nd Airborne to call in AF air strikes. He did a 2 yr tour as an ALO, so we lived the Army lifestyle...trust me the cliches of the AF being the corporate branch is true. Same as the cliche if the Army wanted you have a spouse they would have assigned you one.
~ I was married to Bullet for 5 yrs before he jumped out of perfectly good airplanes as an ALO with the Army. We were college sweethearts and dated throughout his ROTC years. (pinned on his butter bars). I thought I knew every acronym there was to know. I understood what red air and blue air was. I knew what he meant when he said that day he was doing a 4 v4 double turn. Heck, I even knew what they meant by the term pickle...it means your wife is in labor. However, we get to Bragg, and at 5:00 a.m.the morning after we arrived I feel him kiss me goodbye and say I am going to PT and I will be back in a few hours. Groggy I just say I love you and close my eyes to go back to sleep. 30 seconds later my mind takes over and does an acronym search...what is PT? Can't figure it out at all which meant now I am wide awake and waiting to find out what the heck that term meant!
~~ Just saying for the AF they don't do mandatory PT as a squadron. If they do, it is called golfing!
It is a different world and when you have to live it 24/7/365 for 5 years I will never waiver from my statement that an SA education just because it is an SA is not wise in my decision especially if you have ROTC and plan B scholarships in hand. You can stay at your school, and transfer from AFROTC to NROTC or AROTC with maybe the only hardship is losing your ROTC scholarship. You will still commission and nobody in the AD world cares about whether or not you are an SA grad, ROTC or OTS. They care about how you do your job.
OBTW, for those that say spread the wealth from an MOC nomination perspective, here is again why I disagree.
1. My DS like every other candidate had to list on his nomination packet what SAs he was requesting a nomination for. He put only 1. USAFA. Line 2 and 3 were left empty. He received all 3 MOC nominations.
~ Nobody held it against him that he did not want to go any other SA. During his MOC interviews they asked him point blank why he did not ask for any other nomination. He answered honestly...because even if I do not get a nomination to USAFA, I will than move onto plan B, ROTC. It was AF and AF only
~ By having only USAFA and not gaming the system, he got 3 more chances before he had to hit the national pool. Had he gamed it and put USAFA #1 on Cong. slate, USNA #1 on Sen A slate. and USMA on Sen B slate. He would have had only 1 slate to win that appointment for USAFA before hitting the pool.
I get it, it was a risk, but to him he wanted the option of 3 slates.
2. Our close friends DS came from a competitive state where they shared the wealth among the MoCs. IOWS, you get 1 nom., and 1 nom only. He decided that he wanted to follow in his Dad's footsteps and fly fighters, but instead of for the AF he wanted Navy. He only applied to USAFA and USNA. 2 of the 3 he placed USNA as number 1. The last he placed USAFA. Lo and behold he gets a principal, but to USAFA and no nom to USNA. His folks had the smarts to call that MoC and see if they would switch it to USNA. The staff said give us a few days to see if we can. Well the staff called the principal for USNA and she said, YES switch because USAFA was her 1st choice, not USNA. They both commissioned in 2012. He is an F18 pilot now.
~ The point is had she said no, he would have never gone to his number 1 SA choice.
Beware when you suggest to any poster here without knowing their state and if their MoCs talk you might be forcing their hand into a branch that they do not want to serve in, but may go down that road just say they are going to an SA.
My 0.01754 cents and with $2.07 more you can get a small coffee from Starbucks.