LTLONGAGO said:
During our visit to VA Tech, the tour guide joked about how the Business School lines up tables outside the engineering building to recruit freshman engineers as they walk out devastated after their mid-terms and finals!
DD attends VT and she has said that too. She has many friends who on the 1st day of classes came home with a long face compared to kids like her in Psych/Soc who were pumped.
Why? They were told look to the left, look right. One of you will not graduate as an engineer. Her female friends were even more disheartened because the prof went onto say and if you are a female the odds of graduating is 1 out of 3, instead of 2 out of 3.
Have to be honest, to me as a Mom of a DD I thought that was a very sexist comment!
BACK on topic.
What I find interesting is like LTLONGAGO stated, why not wait. I would have to say after being here for 3 yrs., it is uncommon not to get the transfer. It is frightening this yr especially because the budget constraints DOD is currently feeling, so I would think this might be the yr that you will not see many of them, but in previous yrs it was common. Many posters here have experienced it. Some elect not to go through this process because to drop deposits at multiple colleges can be very costly.
docgoatdad,
congrats for your nephew on making his decision. I truly hope it works out for him. In case you didn't understand why some opt for the NROTC scholarship over no scholarship when money really isn't the game player (merit money usually happens for the majority of ROTC scholarship recipients), it is about getting advance standing as a C300.
If you do not get advanced standing you cannot get commissioned. Again due to budgetary and manpower reasons this is becoming a very common occurrence. It is the belief, right or wrong that at least on scholarship they have an upper hand when it comes to that point. I don't believe it does necessarily, what I do believe is that scholarship recipients usually make this marker for 1 reason...their gpa from minute one is tied to that scholarship, fall under the min., and they lose it. Money for school is a big motivator for many kids.
DS is AFROTC scholarship and he also received merit from the school. The school's min gpa is lower than the AFROTC. AFROTC if I recall correctly is 2.8, and the school is 2.5. Translation if he only followed the merit min and not the AFROTC min he would have been SOL for SFT, and that would equate into no commissioning.
OBTW as I stated to LTLONGAGO, don't ever just do the min., you need to beat it and big time. DS has a 3.4+ cgpa as a jr.
It is clear to see NROTC is following suit of AFROTC. Scholarships are getting harder to get and they are cutting things. If I read correctly on a post, your nephew since he is not a NROTC scholarship recipient will now not even be eligible for a summer cruise. Another thing that tallies into that 180K total which you may not be putting into the equation.
When he goes up for that career field board and they have 1 spot left between 2 people (1 being him), somebody is going to be left out in the cold.
Now suppose it is between him and another mid who is NROTC scholarship with an equivalent gpa, and did a summer cruise, where your nephew did not do the cruise. Who do you think they will pick? Ten will get you twenty the mid on scholarship and that cruise was a player in the equation.
Anyone who has ever served or been closely associated with anyone that served (i.e. spouse) knows for a successful military career you do not plan 1 step ahead, you always plan 2 steps ahead. You take an assignment for the fact that it will get you to the next assignment in a better position. You always think about how to make the next rank or position when you are just entering that position. Bullet jumped with the 82nd as an AF ALO, not because of any other reason than it was to get the next step which was flying the F-15E at Elmendorf and as an X in his PRF for joint assignment which would make him more competitive for PME (military grad school). That 82nd tour got him both. He took Pentagon tour because he was winding down his career and it was time to build his network for his 2nd career. There was still one more assignment that we would do prior to retiring, so again it was thinking 2 steps ahead. The PME was done prior to Pentagon and it was done for that last assignment choice, again 2 steps process.
In this day and age as an officer you need a short term goal that will result in obtaining your long term career goal.
Best wishes, thank him for his desire to serve and protect this great nation.