Example: For Class of 2023, approximately 30+ went to EOD Cruise and will likely put EOD as #1 choice. DS reports that only 16 will get EOD. About 50%.
Some communities, by their very nature, have a very limited number of midshipmen who can be assigned in that community. The midshipmen competing for those limited spots usually understand this from the beginning and also understand that their second choice can essentially be their “first” choice. There may be disappointment but seldom surprise.
Having said that, just because the “quota” is 16, I think they can be flexible enough to, maybe, assign 20 to EOD if there are four more midshipmen equally as qualified as the 16th midshipman selected. Take 4 EOD spots away from other commissioning programs!
You can stop reading here, but I’d like to share a story that I’m familiar with that happened with the Medical Corps selectees for the class of 2013. That year, the Navy was only going to permit 10 to go into the Medical Corps. It wasn’t a quota. It was a
limit. Unlike the other communities, if nobody wanted to go into the Medical Corps from the Naval Academy, the Navy would’ve been fine with that. They’re not going to force anybody to be a doctor. They’ll get their doctors from somewhere else. The academy picked 10 and an alternate. Very competitive! Typically, the alternate doesn’t go into the Medical Corps because they usually don’t even try to get into medical school once they find out that they’re an alternate. Why should they waste their time and money applying to medical schools if the only way the Navy will permit them to go to medical school (even if accepted!) is if one of the 10 selectees drops out? That almost never happens. That year, the alternate was assigned SWO. Yet, this midshipman
did apply to medical school -
and got accepted. That midshipman put in a special request to have his service selection reconsidered in light of the fact that he
did get accepted into medical school. To the Navy’s credit, they raised the “limit” to 11 and allowed him to go into the Medical Corps. Where did that extra spot come from? Perhaps somebody, somewhere, maybe in some NROTC program, or some civilian student applying for the HPSP or USUHS scholarship, did not get accepted in order
to open up that
one spot for that midshipman at the Naval Academy.
In think
that’s the way it should work!