College Credit with AROTC

jakesam

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When I start college I will have 60 hours of college credit and would basically start as a Junior. Is this allowed in AROTC or is there a limit on how many credits you are allowed to transfer? Thanks
 
AROTC is based on a four year 120 credit program. You will be required to take 120 credits in four years at your college/university. The 60 credits may assist you in double majoring or adding a minor.
 
Look to maximize what you can get out of the scholarship and how to best use those hours to study what you are interested in. My DD had 30 hours when she started her Freshman year. You can look at the possibility of a double major and also use those extra hours to make each semester a little easier. She is a Div I athlete and is only taking 12 hours including ROTC this semester as she travels a few days almost every week. There is no rush to be a grown up, enjoy your college time and look to explore new things.
 
AROTC is based on a four year 120 credit program. You will be required to take 120 credits in four years at your college/university. The 60 credits may assist you in double majoring or adding a minor.
This is school and major dependent. Some BS degrees require 134 credits.

For the OP - Academically you may be a Jr, even recognized as a Jr by your school for class enrollment and housing priority, but for AROTC it will be based on your CC 104R (Academic Alignment Sheet). Key here is that you list all your courses required for graduation and completion of required ROTC classes for each semester/quarter to determine your graduation date. You have to be a full time student every semester/quarter until your final semester/quarter. Most places this is 12 credits minimum. Additionally, you have to complete all the required ROTC classes to commission but there are alternatives to get this done. Some students attend the Basic Course for MS1/2 credit. Others double up on MS1/2 or fit MS1 classes in over the time in school. This is something to discuss and decide with your cadre. Your graduation date has to align with the needs of the ROTC BN to commission officers in that fiscal year.

Many of your 60 credits won't 'count' toward your degree so you likely have more than 2 years to complete your requirements. This is school dependent. The answer to your question is also dependent on your situation - for example 4 year scholarship recipient, 3 year, non scholarship......

So - discuss this with the ROTC unit.
 
+1 @AROTC Parent

Contact the Army ROTC Recruiting operations officer (ROO) at the college you plan on attending and discuss the matter with him or her.
 
When I start college I will have 60 hours of college credit and would basically start as a Junior. Is this allowed in AROTC or is there a limit on how many credits you are allowed to transfer? Thanks
OP - When and if you complete the AROTC application be cautious in identifying credits received from dual enrollment or AP classes as completed college courses. Some schools will not accept the credits except for General Education or Electives - this is actually a good thing for HS ROTC scholarship applicants. The HS ROTC scholarship offer requires you to not have completed some amount of college - I am not sure the amount but search on this forum. Identify the courses completed in HS as an example of academic rigor but not as 'college courses completed'.

Many other 4 year scholarship recipients also have 30+ credits going into college. They use this great situation to take higher level courses, to repeat courses for GPA enhancement, or for academic exploration.
 
Thanks for the help, I will make sure to figure out my options when I apply for a scholarship
 
My DD is in a Middle College & High School also, and she will apply this year to ROTC Scholarships, and for what I understand, even if she graduate from HS and College at same time with almost 60 College credits, she has to apply to the ROTC Scholarships and Colleges as a Freshman, because not all Colleges with validate her credits.
 
My DD is in a Middle College & High School also, and she will apply this year to ROTC Scholarships, and for what I understand, even if she graduate from HS and College at same time with almost 60 College credits, she has to apply to the ROTC Scholarships and Colleges as a Freshman, because not all Colleges with validate her credits.
That's true... not all colleges will validate her credits. Even if they did validate all her credits, she would generally still need to be there for four years as ROTC is set up to be a 4 year program. She may be able to speed things up a bit, but I wouldn't plan on it... life intervenes.
 
Talkd to an officer at one of the Universities I'm considering attending... You CAN do the ROTC program in around 2 years it would just be more difficult. Also, most in-state public colleges have agreed to accept my credits; private universities such Duke won't take a single one.
 
Talkd to an officer at one of the Universities I'm considering attending... You CAN do the ROTC program in around 2 years it would just be more difficult. Also, most in-state public colleges have agreed to accept my credits; private universities such Duke won't take a single one.
Thanks for the info, yeah duke makes you retake it all
 
What is hard to see here is that there is no rush. If you are on an ROTC scholarship, most of your schooling is paid for and your "job" is to get your education, learn to be a leader through ROTC and most importantly live a little. You will learn more and build better relationships with the individuals going through the process together. Do not cheat yourself out of this experience because you think it will be better to have finished college. One day you will be old and look back on the things you missed out on. Live in the moment as every step in life is great if you make it that way.

I sure as heck did not feel that way when i was there, but later in life I see how special those four years were and would not trade them for anything.
 
Talkd to an officer at one of the Universities I'm considering attending... You CAN do the ROTC program in around 2 years it would just be more difficult. Also, most in-state public colleges have agreed to accept my credits; private universities such Duke won't take a single one.
You CAN do the program by going to basic camp to take the place of your MS1 and MS2 years but to my knowledge that is not a path that is available to use a 4 year high school scholarship for. @MohawkArmyROTC or @clarksonarmy might have more info and definitely more accurate than mine. Those that do it in 2 years go to basic camp typically between their sophomore and junior year so they can be an MS3 their junior year. Being in ROTC is not the same as having a scholarship.
 
When I start college I will have 60 hours of college credit and would basically start as a Junior. Is this allowed in AROTC or is there a limit on how many credits you are allowed to transfer? Thanks

As others have stated, that is possible. You need at least 4 Semesters to complete the ROTC program, but you will need to earn basic course credit for the two years you missed. The ways you can earn Basic Course credit is by: completing 4yr of HS JROTC, Basic Camp, or Basic Combat Training.

Odds are that not all 60 of your credits will count towards your major and you will have more than 4 semesters to graduate. If you have 6 or more semesters you can compress the MS1 and MS2 classes. 5 or less, you will have to earn Basic Course Credit from one of the options I listed.

Typically you will need more than 5 semesters remaining in order to compete for a scholarship as the shortest scholarship is 2YRs, and normally Cadet Command does not give it out same semester start scholarships.

You can contract with ROTC as a scholarship or non-scholarship cadet.
 
DS received an offer for a Type 1 HS AFROTC scholarship, so I can only speak from that perspective, but I can share our experience. We just got back from visiting the Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University campus. DS will have 33 hrs of dual credit college courses by HS grad (May). ERAU agreed to accepting 23 of those as direct transfers (more than we were thinking they would). As previously stated, all campuses are likely to have different policies, but his schedule at ERAU will be rigorous enough, each semester, even with the transfer credits, that it won't affect his full-time student status. All it will do is allow him to not reach "unbearable" state with his course load. And, in a few instances, it will free him up to take a few alternate courses in situations where he would have had to choose between two elective technical courses, both of which he would have wanted.

He will still have to complete 4 years, and he will still have to remain full-time status, but now he has some latitude on course choices. He also had/has the opportunity to bypass his freshman calculus, due to his AP calc class he's currently taking, but he chose to forego the credit and take it anyway, because he is taking some REALLY difficult classes at ERAU, and feels he could benefit from retaking the class at ERAU, as it will act as a stepping stone for a lot of his classes afterward.

He also had/has the option to skip his first year of ROTC GMC courses, by virtue of his Civil Air Patrol Amelia Earhart Award, but has opted to not do so, after visiting with the ROTC detachment leader. The leader stated he could do so, and come in as a "Super Freshman," but it would complicate things, regarding his class ranking with ROTC (which is a potentially different ranking than the one the college recognizes...i.e. you could be ranked a junior with the college but be ranked a sophomore in ROTC or vice versa. Your scholarship is affected by your ROTC class ranking, not the college's.). It would mean that he would have to go through Field Training the summer after his freshman year, instead of his sophomore year, and might complicate things, in terms of his commission and when he would be required to report as active duty (potentially leaving him obligated to report before he earned all his credits for his degree). He said it could be done, but he would advise just going ahead with the full 4 year ROTC plan, to keep it simple. So, if he accepts the offer, that's what he intends to do. He is currently trying to decide between AFROTC and accepting an appointment to the AFA (just found out two days ago), but is leaning toward ROTC.

I don't know if his situation provides you with any guidance, particularly given that you are referring to AROTC, but I hope so, since they work generally the same. The short answer is that, if you are planning on a highly technical major, it is probably unlikely that your transferred credits will negatively affect your ROTC plan, and may actually help give you some breathing room/latitude on your academic schedule, but don't plan on it shortening your overall length of time in school. But your ROTC detachment would be able to say for sure.
 
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