Two More Female Marines Dropped from Infantry Course

Freda'sMom

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The Marine Corps, along with the other services, has been evaluating how to comply with the order to gender-integrate its combat arms specialties by the end of this year, or apply for special exemptions.

With the two most recent drops, there have been 29 attempts by female officers to pass the course since women have been allowed to volunteer, with none making it to graduation.

Only four female officers have made it beyond the initial day of training, a grueling evaluation known as the Combat Endurance Test, or CET. Male officers also regularly fail to pass the CET, and the overall course has a substantial attrition rate for males.

The results of the Marine Corps’ experimentation thus far has revealed a pattern: Female enlisted Marines have been able to graduate from the enlisted School of Infantry’s Infantry Training Battalion in Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, though at a lower rate than male enlisted Marines, while female officers have faced great difficulty in graduating from the course in Quantico.

If the enlisted females can make it, what is the issue with the female officers failing the course?

Is it simply a failure to prepare by the candidates, or is something else going on to ensure female officers are not passing?
 
The Infantry Officer's Course (IOC) is infinitely more difficult than the enlisted program. Extremely physically demanding starting with the first day's CET -where males and females drop at high rates.
 
Yes. There is something going on. It's called sexual dimorphism. And a refusal to change standards for the sake of political agendas.

If you've got males failing it in large numbers, what makes you think they are doing something purposeful to fail the females? A lot of political pressure is being put on the Marines and Army to make it happen. The last thing they are going to do is purposefully fail females. For now, they are just keeping standards the same. That will probably change...
 
Must be a conspiracy. Couldn't have anything to do with their performance or abilities. This must be someone's fault.
 
We had a visit from our USNA '14 "sponsor daughter" this past weekend, currently at TBS. She and her friends are tracking the IOC trials closely, and adamantly don't want the standards dropped. They have heard no scuttlebutt of uneven treatment. IOC is a tough, tough go. As it should be.


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Yes, IOC is harder than the enlisted training course. IOC is no joke, attrition isn't horrible in general, but it isn't zero either. Although I went to TBS many years ago, many of my friends are still serving. When we discuss this topic we all agree the standard should not drop. Most men get another shot at the school if they are injured or dropped for a class. The women I believe are not at this point. Them attending IOC already is slowing them from attending their MOS schools and getting to the fleet, so to have them wait for another class and try again will delay them another 2-4 months from going to MOS school and the fleet.
 
There might be a consipspiracy. Unless things have changed drastically (I went to Army Infantry Officer Course back in 1994), I am pretty sure some females can pass the Army Infantry Officer Basic Course right now with no changes to the standard. My memory might be failing, but if I remember correctly only "physical" requirement we had to meet to graduate were passing the APFT, passing the water combat survival test, advance land navigation test, and a 5 mile run under 40 minutes. I think the longest time we spent out in the field at one time was 5 days. During my days, I don't recall any academic failure to doing bad during field problmes. We did do the Darby Queen (Ranger School obstcale course), but as a familiarization and not for pass/fail and later in the class.

Army is not letting females attend their Infantry Officer Basic Course, where females chance of passing is seems to be higher the Marine Corps IOC. The Marine Corps is letting female officers try IOC, but their chance of passing is a lot lower.
 
There might be a consipspiracy. Unless things have changed drastically (I went to Army Infantry Officer Course back in 1994), I am pretty sure some females can pass the Army Infantry Officer Basic Course right now with no changes to the standard. My memory might be failing, but if I remember correctly only "physical" requirement we had to meet to graduate were passing the APFT, passing the water combat survival test, advance land navigation test, and a 5 mile run under 40 minutes. I think the longest time we spent out in the field at one time was 5 days. During my days, I don't recall any academic failure to doing bad during field problmes. We did do the Darby Queen (Ranger School obstcale course), but as a familiarization and not for pass/fail and later in the class.

Army is not letting females attend their Infantry Officer Basic Course, where females chance of passing is seems to be higher the Marine Corps IOC. The Marine Corps is letting female officers try IOC, but their chance of passing is a lot lower.

True, but you're comparing apples and oranges. IOBC isn't IOC. The tough part of IOBC is having to go to Ranger school afterward. Everyone knows you go no place in the infantry without a tab. So while IOC front-loads the toughness in physical tasks, women stand no better chance of making into the Army infantry in a meaningful manner until one passes Ranger school.
 
True, but you're comparing apples and oranges. IOBC isn't IOC. The tough part of IOBC is having to go to Ranger school afterward. Everyone knows you go no place in the infantry without a tab. So while IOC front-loads the toughness in physical tasks, women stand no better chance of making into the Army infantry in a meaningful manner until one passes Ranger school.

True enough. Folks like you and me know enough to make the distinction, but would non-military folks understand your point?

On a sidenote, two of my former Infantry Battalion commanders didn't have Ranger tabs, but they made GOs and one of them even ADC of an active duty infantry division. I don't know how it is now, but in the old days (mid 90s) mechanized infantry units were less forgiving on Infantry officers not have Ranger tab than light units (i.e. non Ranger tab Infantry officer getting line platoon, scout platoon, ane line company command).
 
That begs an interesting question. If females can pass IBOLC, but not Ranger school (or at least passing in much higher %'s in the former than the latter), might there not be a new paradigm created where "you can go places in the Infantry without the tab?" I still think they'll change the standards at Ranger school and perhaps IBOLC also. But if they didn't, I could see the Army bowing to political pressure in a different way and changing promotion requirements within the Infantry career field. You know, a compromise that looks good to the politicians...
 
There might be a consipspiracy. Unless things have changed drastically (I went to Army Infantry Officer Course back in 1994), I am pretty sure some females can pass the Army Infantry Officer Basic Course right now with no changes to the standard. My memory might be failing, but if I remember correctly only "physical" requirement we had to meet to graduate were passing the APFT, passing the water combat survival test, advance land navigation test, and a 5 mile run under 40 minutes. I think the longest time we spent out in the field at one time was 5 days. During my days, I don't recall any academic failure to doing bad during field problmes. We did do the Darby Queen (Ranger School obstcale course), but as a familiarization and not for pass/fail and later in the class.

Army is not letting females attend their Infantry Officer Basic Course, where females chance of passing is seems to be higher the Marine Corps IOC. The Marine Corps is letting female officers try IOC, but their chance of passing is a lot lower.

These days there is a great emphasis on IBOLC as a prep for Ranger School, particularly for active duty officers, who are constantly reminded they are expected to continue on to and succeed in RS. No doubt RS is much more rigorous than IBOLC, but IBOLC is not for slouches. Current physical requirements include a timed 12 mile ruck march, which must be completed in under 3 hours (I believe this is identical to the RS RAP week requirement), as well as a 16 mile march which must be completed. There are other timed and untimed ruck marches as well. Also, Leader Forge is longer than the five days you were out in the field.

If and when women are admitted to IBOLC and RS, it will be interesting to see whether they are expected to carry the same loads as men, as well as additional burdens of machine guns and ammunition. I imagine that peer reviews could be problematic.

Don't rule out the possibility that IBOLC has changed since you were a pup and your memory is failing.

All of this stuff about whether or not women will be admitted to Ranger School is probably moot. According to the cutting edge news source DuffelBlog, Ranger School has been replaced with a 9 week long online game.

http://www.duffelblog.com/2015/01/ranger-school-replaced-by-9-week-long-online-game/
 
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These days there is a great emphasis on IBOLC as a prep for Ranger School, particularly for active duty officers, who are constantly reminded they are expected to continue on to and succeed in RS.

Guess certain things have not changed. When I went to IOBC, similar emphasis on Ranger School.
 
DD just graduated from TBS and I asked about this...she said it's completely understandable that female officers DOR because 1) it's very tough and 2) there's no benefit - even if she could make it through, that MOS is not open to her. So dropping after day one is a bit much but dropping is completely not. How many of us would be willing to get beat down just to prove a point?
 
How many of us would be willing to get beat down just to prove a point?

Someone needs to. For whatever forward progesses we made our society, we had folks who got "beat down" to prove a point.
 
Joining the chorus, as somebody who's gone through IOC. Whoever wrote that it is "infinitely" more difficult than the enlisted version is correct. The CET, and the physical missions of IOC in general, put a premium on upper body strength and ability to hike/ruck far and fast carrying weight and a lot of it. A woman who is a gymnast-type in build and has great proportional upper body strength and rocks her way through obstacles requiring upper body strength may structurally simply not be able to carry the full combat load over time without injury (which accounts for a lot of the female attrition from those who've tried IOC, from what I understand). A bigger-framed woman who can carry the combat load without as much problems may have difficulty with the upper body strength requirements. (And as others may know, there's plenty of talk about how to reduce the combat load for the average infantryman anyway, without reducing his fighting capabilities in terms of firepower.)

And the "no two bites at the apple" rule -- reasonable, given that infantry is not a current MOS for women and this is being done for purposes of the study -- is significant, given what is still a fairly small sample size. I've talked to some young female USNA grads in TBS who could be good candidates for IOC -- really capable Marines -- who are serious about getting to work and won't be taking on the IOC challenge, given the time and risk of injury that could keep them out of their "real job" for a very long time. I don't blame them at all for that decision, while having a lot of respect for those who do take on IOC.

A lot of people assumed the Marines would try to rig the dice on this, whether by waving the women through IOC with warm scented towels or by running them out of the program. Neither is happening right now. Whether or not down the road someone will say that IOC (or by extension, Ranger School) "overdetermines" the qualities one needs as an infantry officer, I don't know. But for now there's nothing shady going on, from my perspective.
 
GoSox - excellent commentary. I went through IOC in the late 80's and agree 100% with your comments regarding the physical strengths required for successful completion. Glad to hear from a recent IOC grad regarding the course.

Semper Fi!
 
GoSox, great post. I went through TBS awhile ago, but not a million years ago either. My ex was an instructor there also, so never experienced it, but havea decent idea of what the course is. When my buddies and I have have had this debate and our conclusion on what types of females would be successful are exactly yours. I am built like a bowling ball and could carry a heavy pack with extra gear with no issue. I think our heaviest at TBS weighed in around 110. I am no speed demon and have decent strength, but my pull up strength and speed suck, so parts of IOC I would of done well at and others sucked, I would of never made it. I had other buddies just as you mentioned amazing strength, but they were 5'2" and 110 lbs. 100 lb pack on a 110 lb person generally resulted in a lot of stress fractures from what I saw, I think its a combo of weight being carried and women's bodies. Do I know females who could have made it... I think so, but they are those 1 in a 100 women who scored a 290 on the PFT (on the men's chart) and did the EOD screeners at school "for fun".
 
There might be a consipspiracy. Unless things have changed drastically (I went to Army Infantry Officer Course back in 1994), I am pretty sure some females can pass the Army Infantry Officer Basic Course right now with no changes to the standard. My memory might be failing, but if I remember correctly only "physical" requirement we had to meet to graduate were passing the APFT, passing the water combat survival test, advance land navigation test, and a 5 mile run under 40 minutes. I think the longest time we spent out in the field at one time was 5 days. During my days, I don't recall any academic failure to doing bad during field problmes. We did do the Darby Queen (Ranger School obstcale course), but as a familiarization and not for pass/fail and later in the class.

Army is not letting females attend their Infantry Officer Basic Course, where females chance of passing is seems to be higher the Marine Corps IOC. The Marine Corps is letting female officers try IOC, but their chance of passing is a lot lower.

These days there is a great emphasis on IBOLC as a prep for Ranger School, particularly for active duty officers, who are constantly reminded they are expected to continue on to and succeed in RS. No doubt RS is much more rigorous than IBOLC, but IBOLC is not for slouches. Current physical requirements include a timed 12 mile ruck march, which must be completed in under 3 hours (I believe this is identical to the RS RAP week requirement), as well as a 16 mile march which must be completed. There are other timed and untimed ruck marches as well. Also, Leader Forge is longer than the five days you were out in the field.

If and when women are admitted to IBOLC and RS, it will be interesting to see whether they are expected to carry the same loads as men, as well as additional burdens of machine guns and ammunition. I imagine that peer reviews could be problematic.

Don't rule out the possibility that IBOLC has changed since you were a pup and your memory is failing.

All of this stuff about whether or not women will be admitted to Ranger School is probably moot. According to the cutting edge news source DuffelBlog, Ranger School has been replaced with a 9 week long online game.

http://www.duffelblog.com/2015/01/ranger-school-replaced-by-9-week-long-online-game/

That is a great story(the link). LMAO.
 
So it starts

http://www.army.mil/article/141224/

"Second lieutenant Kelly Derienzo shed her long hair Jan. 11 to be one of the first women allowed to go to Fort Benning's Pre-Ranger Course."

According the article, she "passed Fort Sill's Pre-Ranger Course, which is how male Soldiers earn a slot in the prestigious school."
 
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