Where Are They Now?

I'm going to post this on here about my DS, even though it might not be quite as eventful, or what some might consider glamorous, as some of the graduates above, it is still a path ROTC cadets could take.

We live in the midwest and DS commissioned thru the ECP route from a Military Junior College. He got to attend Air Assault school at age 19 in Fort Benning.

At age 20 he is a 2nd LT in our states national guard in a multi-role bridge engineering unit. They came back from deployment in 2014. I believe that was their 4th or 5th deployment since 2000.
Like active duty fresh 2nd LT's he gets all the tedious duties to do. He is a platoon leader, the units state readiness officer, and a few other roles that i cannot remember. In the few months he has been drilling he has actually been in charge of quite a few different tasks. He will attend BOLC in our state also after he graduates. (2017)

While doing this he is attending big state U and finishing his degree in political science and has decided to pursue a career in law enforcement. This was not what he started out thinking when he started college or ROTC (he was wanting active duty but that did not work out for various reasons) but he adapted.
He is discovering that big state U is quite a culture shock from what he is used to but readily admitted that if he had went there as a freshman he would not have made it. He is also discovering that finding a part time job in a city that has 40,000 other students is not an easy task.

All this he has done and will do within 3 hours of where he grew up and all of tuition and room and board for all 4 yrs has been paid for by either scholarships or tuition assistance in return for his service.
Not that he does not necessarily want to travel or see different areas of the country or world, but he has the rest of his adult life to do that.

I wanted to throw his story out for those that might not want the active duty side or those that just do not get it. There are always other ways to serve our country or community. Also, serving in guard he gets a large variety of tasks as a lot of guard units or short handed and you basically do what needs to be done at anytime.
 
Ah, the "tedious" things. Not sure what other services call it, but Navy terms it "SLJO." S_ _ _ ty Little Jobs Officer. Part of the process. I did my share.
Nice story.
 
Capt MJ said:
Ah, the "tedious" things. Not sure what other services call it, but Navy terms it "SLJO." S_ _ _ ty Little Jobs Officer. Part of the process. I did my share.
Nice story.
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Coast Guard uses SLJO too... Always "enjoyable".
 
My daughter graduated from USMMA near the top of her class in 2011, went to sea on a 3rd mate's license for about year, until she was caught smuggling almost 3 ounces of heroin into the USA.

She is now serving 15 years at FDC SeaTac but is eligible for parole in 3 more years.

Just kidding, she's doing fine with a shore-based job in Virginia. :p
 
Freda'sMom said:
My daughter graduated from USMMA near the top of her class in 2011, went to sea on a 3rd mate's license for about year, until she was caught smuggling almost 3 ounces of heroin into the USA.

She is now serving 15 years at FDC SeaTac but is eligible for parole in 3 more years.

Just kidding, she's doing fine with a shore-based job in Virginia. :p
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One member of my class did time for drug distribution, sad to say...
 
DS graduated USAFA in 2013, 60 days, then off to Laughlin with many of his classmates.

IFS quickly, casual duty for 5 months until pilot training in late Feb 2014. Graduated UPT in March 2015. Chose to go heavies for great reasons (lifestyle, missions, etc) that he would have never considered before pilot training. Plus, UPT wasn't easy for him.

Got the airframe he wanted, and after some TDY (survival, etc) he started in Little Rock on the C130J's in August. He will finish up in February and reports to Dyess in March. He has actually gotten closer to home with each of his moves. Flight training could be a thread in and of itself.

Question to the other Dyess folks. What have their rotations been like over the past year or so? Time/locations if appropriate?
 
Dyess has 2 130 squadrons. Fencers DS is in one, and my DS is in the other. When 1 squadron is deployed the other is stateside doing short tdys.

I would doubt he will be deployed for at least 6 months. TDYs, yes, but deployments..not for a while, mainly due to his timing regarding his report date.

DS probably goes out for about 1 week every month.

The thing with Abilene is housing...make sure he buys in the right district if he is buying a home.
 
Pima and Fencer, do your sons know each other? Have they become friends? That would be pretty cool, I assume the two of you know each other thru this medium.
 
My son graduated from USAFA in 2014. He spent a good portion of his 60 day leave in Europe with some USAFA buddies. At the end of the Leave, he reported to Columbus Ms for UPT. He was on Casual Duty until his UPT class started in Dec. He got to ferry students to and from the Flightline. He has done fairly well at UPT but did not get the track he wanted (fighters). He was fine with it and he is looking at different airframes in the Heavies group. One he has mentioned is Spooky (AC-130 Gunship), he does not know how difficult it is to get one of those, and possibly working with Spec Ops. He likes the Osprey alot, but I told him, if he gets one, I want to be the rear gunner. He told me he would see what he can do about that.

I think he is exactly where he should be. I am not really sure where he wants to be stationed, we are from Delaware originally, so Dover might be a good fit for him. My wife and I now live in Florida, he has mentioned a few of the bases here as a possibility. He has also mentioned Hawaii would be cool. He is 24 yo, I think he looks at it as an adventure, and you only get one chance to be young.
 
DevilDog said:
Pima and Fencer, do your sons know each other? Have they become friends? That would be pretty cool, I assume the two of you know each other thru this medium.
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Yes, our DSs know each other, they were in the same class at Hell Rio. They and their wives have dinner quite often. They celebrated Thanksgiving together at our DSs home. They live @1/2 a mile away from each other.

Fencer and I met each other for the 1st time at our DSs winging back in 14...7 years after joining this forum.
 
I graduated through Army ROTC in 2014 onto Active Duty and then went straight to the FA BOLC course at FT Sill. My MOS/AOC is 13A (Field Artillery Officer) with Additional Skill Identifiers of L7 (Joint Fires Observer) and 5U (Tactical Air Operations). I'm currently a Fire Support Officer for an Infantry Company in the 4th Infantry Division and live in Colorado.
 
DevilDog said:
Pima and Fencer, do your sons know each other? Have they become friends? That would be pretty cool, I assume the two of you know each other thru this medium.
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Yes, PIMA and I are now very well acquainted. Her son and one of mine were at Del Rio at the same time and ^^^ what she said.

and our experience, and that of our sons, should be illuminating for some of you... totally different paths in high school and then college, to wind up in the same place. So, to those in the process, look toward your end game, and don't necessarily hang your hat on "I ONLY want the Academy" or "It's only ROTC for me."
 
My DD graduated from USNA in 2011 as 2Lt USMC. Then off to TBS where she met her husband who also graduated in 2011. Then she was off to Parris Island as an Adjutant and he off to Pensacola to start flight training for V-22 Osprey track. He had to wait till a class opened up for him so they put him to work flipping burgers at the hanger fast food shack for a few months. As a 1st Lt she was frocked to Captain and made a company commander at Parris Island. Son in law got his wings finally at Corpus Christie and off to San Diego. She and my son in law were married at the Navel Academy Chapel in 2014. Then he went back to San Diego and she back to Parris Island. She is now in a school at Quantico and he is returning from deployment. The good news is that they will see each other at Christmas.

My son Graduated from Mass Maritime USNR. He is currently on a container ship as a 3rd engineer on his way through the Med to the far east. He does make a lot of money when he is out.

In Florida they call those things Palmetto Bugs cockroaches sounds so harsh when a tourist complains.
 
I'm happy to elaborate if folks have any questions.

I graduated in 2013 and started at Vance. I was relatively fortunate with my UPT timeline... Reported at the end of July, left for IFS about three weeks later, and then started UPT about three weeks after returning from IFS. UPT was a blast and I did reasonably well. Graduation was on a Friday, the week before Thanksgiving (2014). As a graduation gift, eight fellow classmates and I were told that Wednesday afternoon to cancel our Thanksgiving plans and instead to book tickets for Sunday to fly out to Spokane for SERE. Survival training in the winter is less of a blast. Every morning was in the single digits, and we never went above freezing, but as I've mentioned on these forums before, my memories of cheering on the Falcons in blues during the 2009 TCU-AF game are less fond. Needless to say, I did the hurry-up-and-wait routine because I didn't start C-17 initial qual at Altus until the end of April. That's much more of a big boy/girl program and consists of a bunch of sims, with two flights and a checkride at the end. I've since moved myself to Dover, DE and have settled in here. It took awhile to get inprocessed and mission qual'd, but I eventually got through and have been on a few good missions so far. Flying the C-17 is not a bad gig!
 
Hey all! I graduated from USAFA in 2014 and PCS'd to Columbus AFB for SUPT. I arrived at Columbus at the end of July '14, went to IFS 1.5 weeks later, and started SUPT in October. I track selected my first choice - helicopters - last June and moved down to Fort Rucker for SUPT-H. I'm finishing up the night tactical (Night Vision Goggle) phase and will graduate and get my assignment in February. Airframe options from Rucker are the UH-1N Huey, HH-60G Pavehawk, or CV-22 Osprey. I'm shooting for an HH-60 and the combat search and rescue (CSAR) mission.
 
Graduated USNA in 2012 and commissioned Marine Corps with an air contract intending to select helos out of flight school.
Reported to TBS in September after a summer "working" TAD in the history department. Finished TBS March 2013 and reported to Pensacola where I sat around doing various menial tasks until July when I started API. Finished API, did IFS, waited a couple months and headed up to Whiting NAS in Milton, FL for primary, beginning November 2013.
Did well-but-not-amazing in primary and after much waffling put jets first and helos second. I had jet grades and if I'd selected two weeks later likely would have gotten them, but got helos, was still thrilled (and honestly looking back on it I'm much happier here than I would be in jets), and drove across the street to south field. LOVED helo advanced and through very fortuitous timing and quite a bit of luck got my first choice, winging in February. Finished up the FRS/RAG a couple months ago and have been a real live fleet aviator flying UH-1Ys for about a month now.
 
I am a 2006 graduate of the Coast Guard Academy. I had a BS in government (public policy focus). Out of CGA I went to the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Vigorous (WMEC-627), a 210' cutter which was, at the time, out of Cape May, NJ. I was a deck watch officer on VIG (as well as a number of other things, including a collateral duty public affairs officer). I was on VIG for two years. From there I transferred to Coast Guard HQ in Washington, D.C., as a public affairs officer. CGHQ was at the Transpoint location (it has since moved to St. Elizabeths). While I was at HQ I attended the 2.5 month public affairs qualification course at the Defense Information School at Ft. George G. Meade, Md. I was at HQ for three years. In my final year at HQ I started my grad program (at night). I got out of the Coast Guard in 2011, went to a PR firm, and then a regulator in DC. I'm a federal employee now.
 
raimius said:
One member of my class did time for drug distribution, sad to say...
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A few years ago an USNA Mid was caught smuggling 150 pounds of weed into the country and was also accused of armed robbery. While he was a Mid!

And earlier this year (Jan 2015) a CGA O-1 (class of 2012 grad) was convicted and sentenced to 3 years for drug offenses in Hawaii.

In light of these actual tragic stories (and multiple more) my post may have been a little insensitive, I apologize.
 
S graduated USNA in 2014. NPS in Charleston and then up to Saratoga Springs for prototype. Still there until next July.
 
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