ROTC Roommate

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bakediddy

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My DS was awarded a 4 year Army ROTC scholarship to study nursing. We are all beyond excited.!

He is weighing the options of rooming with someone in ROTC vs Nursing vs Anyone!

Do you have any advice? Pros? Cons?

I would think having someone in your room on your ROTC schedule would be beneficial to getting up and going to bed!

Thank you.
 
My son and daughter have non-ROTC roommates and they get along fine. I actually think it's good because it exposes them to students outside of ROTC and that social circle. As for nursing, speaking as the husband of a college nursing instructor, I would recommend having a roommate in the Nursing program because it's tough, and as roommates, they can study together.
 
My DS is NROTC and has a roommate who is also NROTC. He found this to be a plus for him. The similar schedules and shared interest in NROTC were helpful. Especially in the beginning of the year, when they were learning the NROTC knowledge packet and adapting to the NROTC culture this was helpful. We were glad it was not an all ROTC dorm though, because it exposed him to other people and experiences he might not have had. Having a roommate in the same major could have its benefits too.
 
My DS has had non-ROTC roomies since freshman year and has become good friends with them.

There are clearly pros and cons either way. One of the Pros of non-ROTC room mates is that if you get up at 0500 for PT, you have no competition for the shared bathroom!
 
My son has a non ROTC roommate as well and they are very close friends. There is no one answer to this question.
 
Yeah, it depends on the kid. DS had a non-NROTC roommate his freshman year and it worked out fine. He decided to rent an apartment with some NROTC buddies for sophomore year. Over the summer, the other guys dropped out of NROTC for different reasons. They still shared an apartment for 2 years and did very well together. The last year he shared an apartment with a fairly new NROTC midshipmen. He dropped at the end of fall semester. Guess my kid was cursed. BTW, he's still good friends with them all and he gets together with them when he can.
 
There is nothing wrong rooming with a fellow Rotc cadet but I wouldnt make the effort to do so freshman or even sophmore year. Eventually once they find their groove with the school and rotc, they will tend to graviate to certain people, be it rotc or not. In my son's case, since his major was Professional flight, he eventually got friendly with all of the other want to be pilots who many were also AF Rotc. My son lived in a dorm freshman year, second year he moved into an apartment that was mixed rotc and non rotc and the last two years he lived in a house that was part of AF Rotc Arnold Air Society (think fraternity). The irony being that one of his roommates is no longer AF Rotc but since he was accepted into Arnold Air Society previous to quitting Rotc, he can still live there
 
Both my son's took the extreme path, they both joined Fraternities, The same one to be exact. Talk about a lesson in Time Management. Older son moved to an apartment his junior year with 3 friends from the Fraternity, younger son spent all 4 years in the house. Neither had ROTC roommates although there were a couple cadets in their house. Neither would change a thing if they did it again, it's all about personal preference.

As others have said it really depends on what your son wants, although I can see the benefit of rooming with someone in the Nursing Program.
 
I'm in ARTOC with non-ROTC suitemates. A positive is I always get the bathroom because no one is awake. A negative is not everyone goes to bed as early as me, so something to keep in mind! It's just a matter of weighing the pros and cons.
 
I'm about to commission as an Army nurse in May. I would recommend rooming with someone in nursing. As stated above it's very benifical to take the same classes as your roomie and bounce questions off one another when you study. Just be upfront about having to get up for PT. After the first year when you figure out your social groups you can pick who you want to live with! I met my roomate (who's nursing as well) at orientation over the summer going into my freshman year and we have lived together the past 4 years and became life-long friends! The only con is that the pool of dude nursing majors is small, out of 120 people in my class we only have 9 guys. Who knows maybe you can have the best of both worlds and find a nursing major who is also in ROTC!
 
My daughter chose a non-ROTC and non-nursing roommate her freshman year, and they got along well! In fact they roomed together again this year. Next year that will change, as ROTC students get room and board included, her roommate will be moving off campus since she doesn’t. So my daughter will be moving in with 4 other ROTC students, and one non-ROTC student. The thing she is nervous about, is that there will be five of them using two bathrooms for morning PT, instead of her being the only one needing to get up at that time. I think it can work either way, just sharing what worked well for her.
 
@ProudDad17 How did you DS get connected with a ROTC roommate at Michigan? This is something my DS would prefer if possible for the reasons stated in your post.
 
Someone at GWU started an Incoming Freshman Facebook page last spring. Via Facebook, my DS arranged to room with a fellow Midshipman and two non-NROTC freshmen in a quad. They are all engineers which has worked out well.
 
goblueDad said:
@ProudDad17 How did you DS get connected with a ROTC roommate at Michigan? This is something my DS would prefer if possible for the reasons stated in your post.
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Sometime in the spring, the freshman adviser sent a group email to all the incoming freshman welcoming them and giving some info. From there one of them started a GroupMe group text where they got to know each other. He found another incoming Mid he connected with and they requested each other as roommates through Michigan housing. I know a few other incoming freshmen did this as well. There is a new freshman adviser now, but I imagine at some point there will be a group email where they can then start a conversation on their own.
 
Bison89 said:
Someone at GWU started an Incoming Freshman Facebook page last spring. Via Facebook, my DS arranged to room with a fellow Midshipman and two non-NROTC freshmen in a quad. They are all engineers which has worked out well.
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Thurston Hall?
 
I am in the same situation. I found a potential roommate who wants to do AROTC and has the same major (Bio/Premed). Just waiting to hear back on their final college decision but I can't think of any cons to having an ROTC roommate. You'll both have similar sleeping schedules but its also great to room with someone who has the same major as you can help each other study and stay motivated. You can't go wrong either way!
 
Thank you @ProudDad17. I think my DS is going to reach out to the freshman advisor. Hopefully, we can meet up with him the weekend of April 20th.

Brutal game last night. To all you Notre Dame fans out there - good luck in the NCAA Hockey Final on Saturday. Great goaltending will win out on Saturday and your goalie is a special player.
 
Good luck and enjoy the tour @goblueDad. My DS said it was really cool visiting campus again after he had been admitted and his scholarship in hand. Still felt surreal, but saw it through a different lens than when we first visited. If they do like they did last year, your DS will be assigned a 3/c as a mentor; maybe even my DS. He should hear sometime over the summer with some information and instructions.

Yes, that was brutal. I was watching the end of the game and resigned myself that I would have to miss OT since I had to be up early this morning. I would have rather missed OT than have the game end the way it did. Hats of to Notre Dame.
 
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