Dropping Army ROTC?

Paying for College
1

<p>Hey all,</p>

<p>So I'm a sophomore at UNC-Chapel Hill and originally thought I was going to be a Nursing major and commission with the US Army. Now, I'm strongly considering changing my major because my interpersonal skills are not right for it and I want to be able to do research and work specifically with pathogens. I love the sciences and am thinking of going into microbiology research instead (which is what I had wanted to do all the way until freshman year college, when I switched to nursing). </p>

<p>Switching to a biology major, minor in chem is not a problem as I haven't even applied to the nursing school yet. </p>

<p>The thing is, for me to be able to actually go into graduate school for microbio, I feel like I'd have to drop AROTC. I know you can do Ed Delay, but I've seen a lot of people get screwed by that, and I don't think I'd want to serve in the military if it's not in healthcare--which, with just an undergrad in biology, wouldn't happen. Doing 3-4 years active in a random branch would just delay what I really want to do. I'd definitely consider going back into the Army after grad school for Army microbiology, but the likelihood of getting Ed Delay for it straight out of undergrad is slim.</p>

<p>Right now, I'm not contracted and not on scholarship. I applied for a scholarship (nursing) but the brigade has no money right now and they told me to apply back in spring. Financially, I could cover college without an Army scholarship. </p>

<p>My parents would actually prefer covering uni on their budget as opposed to the Army's--they are extremely extremely opposed to me doing ROTC. They don't actually know I'm in ROTC, I mentioned "possibly" joining it once or twice and they were not pleased. They didn't even want me in JROTC and they've been very adamant about me not doing any form of ROTC in college. It's been a wild ride hiding this from them, y'all. </p>

<p>Anyway, logically it would make sense to do the jump, switch majors and drop ROTC, but one stupid thing is holding me back. I really, really love ROTC. I love the field training we get to do, I love the camaraderie, I love all of it. I even like ruck marches, you guys. I told myself after JROTC I wasn't going to do ROTC and I only lasted a semester before I hopped back in. I'm doing really well in ROTC, and that plus my GPA (274 PT, 3.8 GPA, lots of community service and extracuriculars) was really helping towards getting the scholarship.</p>

<p>I'm just really attached to ROTC and I don't want to get rid of it, especially since it provided me with a good social network, which, due to my really bad interpersonal skills, is really valuable. It's not my only social network, though.</p>

<p>Is there a way I can keep this without possibly getting screwed by Ed Delay? Should I just drop it now before I've signed any papers and taken out money? Or is it possible to put reserves on your Accessions and go to grad school on your own money that way?</p>

<p>Any advice would be massively appreciated. I'm so sorry if this isn't the right forum for it, I wasn't sure what was best.</p>

2

<p>Why don’t you just keep participating in ROTC without applying for the scholarship?</p>

3

<p>Even if I don’t apply for a scholarship, I’ll have to contract before junior year summer to continue the program, and contracting comes with an obligatory service commitment I’m not sure I want to do instead of grad school.</p>

4

<p>You might want to explore the Army’s “Simultaneous Membership Program” where you are a member of ROTC and the National Guard or Reserves at the same time. This way you could receive your commission into the Guard or Reserves, and thus not go on active duty. Of course, you would be in the Guard or Reserves while in graduate school too. It appears that the SMP program always comes with a scholarship.
<a href=“Path for Army Officers | goarmy.com”>http://www.goarmy.com/rotc/enroll/enlisted.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>There might be other ways to guarantee Guard or Reserve duty, instead of active duty. Perhaps talk to your ROTC adviser, or a Guard recruiter. One way or another, you incur some kind of active duty or reserve obligation if you do ROTC beyond the second year. The only exception that I know of is at Virginia Tech, which has a “Citizen-Leader Track” where you actually don’t enroll in ROTC but participate in all other aspects of their Corps of Cadets.
<a href=“https://secure.hosting.vt.edu/www.vtcc.vt.edu/About/CorpsOnly.php”>https://secure.hosting.vt.edu/www.vtcc.vt.edu/About/CorpsOnly.php&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

5

<p>Would going Reserves via SMP (I really like that idea, I’m going to look into it) have a negative effect on grad school applications? I’m worried they’ll look at that and go “well then she doesn’t have a lot of time to do research…” </p>

6

<p>

I really don’t know, but kind of doubt that it would be a problem. You might talk to some professors at your current school to get their opinion about this. Also, I am not sure that you would be required to share that information. Again, though, this is something I know very little about.</p>