I’m a long time reader and I would like to thank all of you for the information and experience you share here.
I’m posting to ask for some advice concerning a crisis we are currently facing due to our son’s choices.
A little background: my son is a senior who was recently accepted at several wonderful colleges, including an Ivy. He attends an excellent private school, got wonderful test scores, holds leadership positions in several clubs (Debate Team, Asian Students’ Club, and the school newspaper). He has also participated in several academically selective summer programs.
After all this hard work, and great achievements… he has told his father and I that he doesn’t want to go to college next year. Instead, he… wants to join the Marines. I don’t get it. We talked to him a lot about what a dangerous choice this is and about wasting and throwing away everything he’s worked for for the past four years. We both agree that if he wants to take a bit of a break, we would not have a problem with him taking a gap year. But he said he doesn’t want to do that. No, he wants to join the Marines. “College will still be there when I get discharged”.
What do I do when my son is determined to throw his life away? He has recently turned 18 and legally, there’s nothing we can do to stop him.
I’d second the ROTC idea - he’d likely need to take a gap year at this point, but it could be a way for him to get involved with the military like he wants while also helping get his education covered. It might be a good balance if he can get into the program.
When my nephew enlisted, my sister acted as if his future was gone forever. I told my kids that if they ever came to me to tell me they wanted to join the military my response would be “I am so proud of you”. And my nephew served and now is training for his dream job and his veteran status helped him land that job.
Not everyone is ready for college right out of high school. Even a gap year isn’t the right answer for everybody.
Joining the Marines may seem now like “throwing his life away” but it could be the choice that opens up many more future opportunities for him. Remember your point about how he is 18 and the choice is his. Better to be supportive than to cause a rift.
Thanks for the replies. Son is not interested in ROTC or the service academies. No, he wants to enlist first so he can “have that experience” in case he decides on staying and becoming an officer later on.
By saying that he’s throwing his life away, I did NOT intend any disrespect towards people who serve. What I meant to say is that my student has achieved things that not too many kids achieve, and these are the opportunities he is throwing away by enlisting. You can’t defer a college acceptance for 4-6 years. He says he’'ll take community college classes if he has the time and then transfer to a four-year college. He’s worked hard, was rewarded for his hard work, achieved things that other kids would be absolutely ecstatic about, but he is choosing to just throw all this hard work away. I am sad and I just don’t understand.
ROTC is a chance to experience both – and if he sticks with it, come out as an officer in the end. If he decides partway through that he doesn’t want to be an officer, then he could drop out of college and enlist then. I’d try to get him to see the sense in that. Ask him to go to accepted student visits at a couple of schools that have ROTC units on campus and go talk to them during his visit.
My guess is that he will feel pretty dumb about giving up the opportunity to start his career as an officer once he is in if he just enlists now. And maybe the ROTC people can help him see that. But… in the end you can’t decide for him.
Also… THESE colleges may not be there for him when he is discharged.
Whether he enlists or goes as an officer, his physical fitness should be exceedingly high as Marine boot camp or Marine officer training will be even more of an exceedingly painful experience than usual judging by what I’ve heard from several Marine veterans including a pair of brothers who served 20+ years as Marines, fought in Vietnam, and did stints as drill instructors at Parris Island.
A Naval aviator cousin who did NROTC and a father of an older neighborhood kid who ended up as a Nuke submarine officer after USNA both said their NROTC/Annapolis classmates who selected into Marines had more stringent physical fitness requirements than they did.
Another thing I’ve heard from those brothers is that if one’s goal is to become a military officer, it’s often better to do Academy/ROTC/OCS directly rather than enlist first as with the latter as there’s greater possibilities of injuries or making one or more mistakes which could have a seriously negative impact on one’s prospects to become a military officer later…especially in the Marines.
I think it is the parent’s job to make sure the student knows all these things, that moving up in the military is hard as an 18 year old enlisted person, that ROTC and the academies are great opportunities, that he may never have the chance to do an Ivy school again. I’d make sure he talks to lots of military people, both enlisted and officers.
In a few cases that I know of, it was the recruiter who impressed upon the kid how much more valuable he was to the armed forces with a college education under his belt. One kid went on to one of the academies (is now serving in the Middle East); one did ROTC at a big, impressive university and is now in Europe in some sort of intelligence role, and the third just finished med school (free, thank you tax payers) and is being trained to be a flight surgeon.
The Marines know what they need and want- and a high potential recruit is more valuable as an officer than as a grunt. So don’t let the dialogue go too much longer without getting some facts on the table. Who knows if they even want him right now???
That is the best advice on this thread so far. You should talk to the recruiter separately first, then bring him in for a chat. The recruiter probably doesn’t get many situations like this one. Oh, and don’t mention “throwing his life away” to the recruiter. He might not appreciate it.
Can you get your son to commit to trying one year of college first? Tell him if he still feels the Marines is the right path for him after trying college you will support him. That might also give him the option of withdrawing and then returning to colege X. Do the colleges he’s been accepted to have ROTC programs? Has he even spoken to anyone re: ROTC? Did this plan come out of the blue? Or was it something he’d long talked about? I would make sure my S committed somewhere by May 1st and try to get him to weigh different options / paths before commiting to Marines. ROTC seems like a good option. Please keep us posted.
You will not win with sharing how dangerous it is. I also consider that a disengenous argument. Throwing life away is extreme as well although I would emphasize that he should realize the Ivy won’t wait.
Do NOT talk to an enlisted recruiter! Sadly, I have counseled many individuals who spoke with an enlisted recruiter when they should have spoken with an officer recruiter. Usually this is individuals who already have a college degree but I believe it fits here.
Also, he does not need to enlist to become a respected officer. In fact, it can hurt as much as it helps because some people do not transition well from the enlisted mindset to officer mindset. All Marine officers go to The Basic School at Quantico for six months following OCS or ROTC. It is grueling and he will not be able to say he missed the pain of Parris Island. If he goes infantry, infantry officer’s course is even more challenging.
Last, I have seen many bright young men and women bored and struggling to fit in as enlisted unless they chose a hard to get in rate such as cryptology.
ROTC students do take an enlisted cruise the summer after freshman year.
You really should talk with a recruiter. There are several paths to becoming a commissioned officer in the Marines, all require a 4 year degree. It’s a lot harder to earn that degree while in active service vs being a full time student.
Being an officer, is also about networking. Attending a school like TAMU and joining the Corps of Cadets, has real positive career impacts (inside and outside the military).
“…how much more valuable he was to the armed forces with a college education under his belt.”
That. My friends who were spouses of a high echelon all emphasized this…and how much more difficult (and limited) the life is as an ordinary recruit, without the degree first.
But, you need to breathe. Because you need to figure out why he really wants this change in direction, whether he has positive reasons or something else is up or bugging him, what pressures he’s feeling.
To connect with him, you’ll need to set aside the simple notion he’s throwing away “hard work,” no matter how you phase it to us or to him. Thinking that way shuts him down and you want dialogue.
Maybe have him sit with the ROTC folks, get their perspective.
Excellent advice. Sit down with him. Apologize for your initial reaction of throwing it all away but admit that it came as a total shock. Admit it scared you to think of him suddenly in a dangerous job and that you reacted from pure fear.
Then ask him why? What is driving his desire? What does he see himself doing as a soldier? What parts appeal to him? What parts of being an enlisted man is he not looking forward to? does he know the difference between going in with a degree and going in as an enlisted man out of HS. Gauge his knowledge. It will help you understand how seriously he has looked into this choice.
Don’t argue. Let him talk. Listen to him. The more he talks the more you will learn. You will learn nothing if you do the talking.
This is true, of course. But joining the Marines is a minimum three-year commitment, and an individual who has had the experience of three years in the Marines is going to very different from the typical traditional-age college freshman. Most of the students at highly selective colleges, including those in the Ivy League, are of traditional age. A Marine veteran would likely feel out of place on those campuses.
So if the OP’s son goes to college after a period of service in the Marines, he’s likely to want to get his college degree in a different way – perhaps as a part-time student while working, perhaps as a student in a program designed to serve students who are older than the traditional age. There’s nothing wrong with doing it this way, but it’s very different from doing it the traditional way.
He may feel that he’s excelled at school and books and tests, but knows nothing of 'real life’s and wants to test himself : am I a real man? A tough guy? Can I make it through pain as well as through standardized tests?
He may also want to serve - something top schools totally understand , some even provide service opportunities and happy years (Princeton).
It’s really important for him to understand he’s much more valuable to the marines as a college graduate than as a high school graduate. It’s not ‘easier’ for the recruits - they’re not coddled because they have a degree - but if he wants to serve that’s how he can best serve his country.
I wasn’t suggesting that he’d be “coddled” because he has a degree. But he may not realize that as a young HS graduate in the armed services, his “I turned down an Ivy to be here” cred lasts for about a nano second. He might speak three languages fluently; he might have wicked coding skills; he might have a keen interest in military strategy and history, or understand the roots of the Pashtun conflict.
None of that makes a bit of difference if he enlists this summer. It might make an extraordinary difference in ROTC, one of the service academies, or post-grad officer training. There are careers in intelligence, cybersecurity, working with the diplomatic corps, military policy or law, etc. that all require the kind of work ethic and focus that he has. They are a long, tough slog if you serve first- they are a more obvious path if you walk into the military (or crawl, if he still wants to be a Marine, and if they take him) with a degree…
Don’t talk with your son at the kitchen table.The kitchen table or in the house will put him on the defensive as he will still feel the little boy scenario he has grown up with.
Go for a walk where you are on equal ground. Do something that does not force constant direct eye contact. A walk allows for pauses and quiet reflexion . It allows for quiet when you are trying to hold your frustration with one another.
Oh, and I do not envy having these discussions with the captain of the debate team.
