AROTC Advanced Camp 2023
- Thread starter franknd
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And yet, so vital, critical and indispensable to the mission.
“An army marches on its stomach.” - Napoleon.
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Do not disagree, but that doesn't change reality. It's a MOS that gets a lot of other MOS washouts, terrible QOL/hours, and low job satisfaction. Very few people actively choose it if they have other options. Up there with MPs as the most disliked interaction-wise among Joes as well.
So an addition to this. Per son that is there. Half of the cadets are not qualifying with the rifle nor on land Nav. They had one shot at qualifying with the rifle and that was it. Son, who has been shooting AR's for a long time, said it was aweful and that the cadre were not helpful. He qualified but was not happy with the whole experience. He kept his mouth shut and moved on like a good soldier.
Aristobolus
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This year qualifying with the rifle was not required for graduation. They were given half a day vs. a whole day in previous years. Times have changed.
What!!
That is nuts!! Army has changed and not for the better!
My son graduated Friday. FWIW, my perception is that Advanced Camp is more rigorous now than it was when I went in 1986. For example, I don't remember cadets routinely losing 10-20 lbs when I went, which appears common now.
And then this story -- about one of the topics discussed above -- is just an embarrassment. I don't know how general officers allow stuff like this to happen. Just inexcusable.
www.armytimes.com
And then this story -- about one of the topics discussed above -- is just an embarrassment. I don't know how general officers allow stuff like this to happen. Just inexcusable.
Fort Knox cadets taste Army life: walkouts, expired MREs, water issues
Tales of shoddy provisions and contracting woes have flooded social media platforms in recent weeks. Army Times separated fact from fiction.
www.armytimes.com
From the article:My son graduated Friday. FWIW, my perception is that Advanced Camp is more rigorous now than it was when I went in 1986. For example, I don't remember cadets routinely losing 10-20 lbs when I went, which appears common now.
And then this story -- about one of the topics discussed above -- is just an embarrassment. I don't know how general officers allow stuff like this to happen. Just inexcusable.
Fort Knox cadets taste Army life: walkouts, expired MREs, water issues
Tales of shoddy provisions and contracting woes have flooded social media platforms in recent weeks. Army Times separated fact from fiction.
For some aspiring lieutenants, the ambiguous and complex environment that awaited them at CST may have been more than they bargained for.
My Rewording:
For new 2nd Lieutenants, the ambiguous and complex nature of the US Military that awaits them on Active Duty may be more than they expected. It remains the best opportunity for a new college graduate, but the institutional challenges are still huge.
TBVADAD
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"This story was updated on July 15, 2023, at 1:40 pm EST. An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated that some cadets were forced to buy food off-base with their own funds. This was inaccurate. Cadets are not permitted to leave post during the training evolution."
While they can't leave DS was buying pizza and subs cause there was no food. I believe from on post or Door Dash.
While they can't leave DS was buying pizza and subs cause there was no food. I believe from on post or Door Dash.
Bushrod
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Maybe because yours is OPFOR. Mine was OPFOR last summer and a lot of the OPFOR ordered pizza or other DoorDash.
How do you even have expired, rotten MREs in storage, let alone hand them out? That strikes me as falling into the, "You had one job. . . ." category of neglect. But you can be damn sure that if Lloyd Austin visited, he would not receive an expired MRE.
TBVADAD
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Oh for sure. They did that as well before the strike. During the shutdown I know he and others in his platoon had nothing to eat including MREs.
Its a lack of and failure of leadership for some like this to happen.
The water situation is a different situation.
Bushrod
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Terrible situation for everyone, for sure!
So as to the report that a majority of cadets failed to qualify on the rifle range or land navigation - not very encouraging for ROTC. Could one reason for this poor performance be that many of these cadets are on NG and Reserve contracts/scholarships and they know their performance at summer camp will not affect their branch assignments? Just asking for information.
My son was Third Regiment, and he didn't say anything about cadets in his platoon having rifle/land nav problems (although as I mentioned at the top of the thread, he did tell me about the alleged widespread problem with Second Reg (I think it was) re land nav). He said that A&M prepared him very well, in particular, for land nav. Overall, the impression I got was that his platoon was very squared away. One data point, but there it is.
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Highly doubt this is the case. We definitely had some GFRD people who coasted with on-campus ROTC events but by far the top quality cadets on average in my rotation were NG/USAR folks. A lot of them intended to go active but were headhunted with 100K plus job offers waiting for them after graduation. Thus many switched their AD option to GFRD.
More often than not the marginal cadets wanted AD because they knew their job prospects with a 2.75 GPA in general studies was probably not ideal outside of the Army.
In general, most cadets WANT to do a good job. The rifle qualification is a bit harder than it used to be. As for land nav I have no excuses, Fort Knox is far easier than JBLM IMO.
When I was cadre, I also didn't notice anyone grossly coasting or not caring aside from a few outliers.
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I still disagree with the Army's decision to transition CC and cadet training to Fort Knox. Fort Knox is an aging post which I don't think was properly updated even in its waning years as a BCT station. When most of the AD tenant units left and CC/reserves became the main tenants, things didn't get better.
LDAC/CST was at JBLM it was a well-oiled machine with tons of AD and reserve support. Even with a strike I don't see any of this happening...
LDAC/CST was at JBLM it was a well-oiled machine with tons of AD and reserve support. Even with a strike I don't see any of this happening...
When I went to Advanced Camp in 1986, I went to Fort Lewis. We were housed in WWII barracks. Back then, I believe they used three posts for Advanced Camp, and where you went was based on your school. It was a week longer than it is now, but IIRC, we got one, maybe two, 36-hour type passes along the way. The grading wasn't nearly as programmatic as it is now; it was very much based on what your TAC officer thought. There were graded events (i.e. PT, rifle, land nav), but I don't believe they had any direct bearing on end of camp evaluation like they do now.
On the whole, I think it's probably a better product now than it was then, but the food/MRE thing still has me shaking my head.