Don’t worry about this -
For the past several years, a freshman could get to campus sign up for ROTC classes, request to contract and a have a scholarship by the end of the semester or at least the next semester. This year, this is not happening. In the past, there were lots of unused scholarship dollars - however, this year there is a huge increase in AROTC students. More than normal elected to accept their scholarship offer. Going by past practice - some cadets were told a scholarship mid-year would not be a problem but now there is no money left.
Do NOT assume this has anything to do with next years scholarships.
This has nothing to do with the Army not happy with “walk-ons”.
Kids who win 2 or 3 year scholarships make just as good an officer as a 4 year. If they didn’t then the Army would discontinue LTC.
A freshman who is not contracted can do everything that a freshman scholarship winner can do in ROTC - they don’t lose training by not being scholarshipped.</p>
<p>The number of scholarships available to each battalion is a function of number of commissions each year, if the college is a HBCU or Hispanic-serving and the cost of tuition. When you go on the AROTC website and look at colleges, some are designated “high cost” - I would suggest that a student not pick exclusively high cost schools.</p>
<p>As private colleges go, most of goaliegirl’s schools are considered low (by private standards), but it would be nice to confirm this.</p>
<p>The one unit being considered that is all 2nd-level publics would appear to be quite favorable if the Army does look at cost in the decision of how many scholarships to allocate.</p>
<p>I’ll give the Army one thing… They are very effective in keeping candidates from gaming the scholarship process. ;)</p>
<p>Goaliedad, I have to ask you-why is your daughter interested in the Army? Why not the Air Force? Sorry if you have already addressed this, it is a long thread.</p>
<p>Not a question that has been addressed. There are a few reasons, most importantly that there are only 2 schools with AFROTC and Womens D3 ice hockey. There are about a dozen AROTC schools with on-campus (or near campus) opportunities. That makes it a numbers game. Both AFROTC schools are AROTC schools, so adding AF to the mix didn’t expand the school opportunities. </p>
<p>Her intended major is not in the list that makes it easy to get the best of the AF scholarships. AFROTC is a lot more cometitive as well.</p>
<p>Her career interests can be addressed in either service, but Army does have a sheer numbers advantage in that field. </p>
<p>And probably most imporantly, the lifestyle that attracted her to a miliatry career is probably more along the lines of Army (field operations) and perhaps the Marines than the Air Force. And the next question is that Marines is only available at 1 school with Womens D3 ice hockey.</p>
<p>Okay, well that makes sense. I’m asking because, as a woman who spent many years in the military with family/friends in both services-it is my opinion that life is AlOT better for women in the AF than in the Army or Marines. Now maybe someone can give you some better and more current data than I have to offer, but if she ends up having several options available to her, I strongly recommend that you both spend some time talking to women in each service (which you may have already done).</p>
<p>busdriver11 - my daughter chose army over air force. She would not even consider air force even though her grandfather is a retired AF officer. She is not interested in flying planes, more interested in flying helicopters; as he learns about the different Army branches she is learning more about her options.
Back in the day - women in the Army and AF did basicall the same jobs - administrative type work. Yes, women have been historically treated better in the AF.
However, many more jobs are open to women in the Army now and women want to fill them. They want to “get dirty” and do the same job as their male counterpart.</p>
<p>Justamom, you are right-everything is the AF is built around flying. Of course not everyone is a pilot, but the mission is around supporting the planes. I’m pretty sure that most jobs are now open to women in the AF too, even combat flying. What I am concerned about is how women are treated now in the services. If I had an interested daughter, I would love to sit down and talk to a current female officer (because these kids are going to be officers, going to college) and find out the reality. I don’t have a daughter, I am just curious. And I don’t know how to say this delicately, but the percentage of women raped on Army bases used to be shockingly high, double digits. Now for all I know that is the same as college campuses, with partying and people they know, I don’t know. I pray that is not a factor any more.</p>
<p>Actually she has spoken with quite a few career women. One is a retired Lt Col with 5 children, who moved up through the enlisted ranks and served two tours in Baghdad. At West Point there are quite a few female officers there who serve as great role models and mentors. The staff at ROTC battalions are much smaller but many have female officers as well.<br>
You are right to be concerned about sexual assault in the military. It is prevalent across all services. The DOD, each branch of the military, the service academies and all ROTC has made this a high priority in not only prevention but prosecution. I actually have had many conversations with my daughter about this.</p>
<p>Thanks for pointing that out JAM. I hadn’t noticed “high cost” units before. Perhaps that is because none of goaliegirl’s top 5 units have that description. I guess that is because most of her host schools are publics. </p>
<p>I find it interesting that they categorize by unit as opposed to by school. If the Army decides to reduces the number of high cost school budgets, I imagine the publics within those units will probably suffer more than publics in uncategorized units, despite having similar tuitions.</p>
<p>If there is a cap, I have never heard of it. My understanding, based on all the conversations I have had with PMS in various battalions, is that they pay full tuition regardless of the actual amount. Where the money does matter is if you want to transfer scholarship from school A to school B, and school B is much more expensive than school A, which kind of makes sense: this will put the scholarship over budget from original allocation they had in mind. </p>
<p>Among all the battalions that I checked, it was the battalion that served only private schools that had 100% scholarship cadets, while the school school battalion only had 30% of their cadets with national, full tuition scholarship.</p>
<p>My D2 considers both ROTC and AROTC. I heard through the grapevine that the amount of scholarship money is going to get reduced in the coming years. Does anybody know anything about these reductions? Are they going to affect all branches of the military equally?</p>
<p>Son shared news yesterday that one of his good friends received an appointment to AFA, but he’d rather go AFROTC at Penn State, so he’s waiting for that news. </p>
<p>Another friend has received her appointment to USNA, but is waiting on Duke ED and her NROTC app there. </p>
<p>I would like to think both of these kids have great shots at their ROTC preference, right? </p>
<p>For us, S was summoned to the Guidance office yesterday because his #1 school called the HS. The college was asking, “where’s this kid’s app? We have all the other pieces, but no app.” Fortunately, he was able to tell them that he had submitted (RD) on Sunday, the day before. I don’t want to jinx it, but it sure would be nice if this was a sign that ROTC had consulted admissions in anticipation of the Nov boards.</p>
<p>Sounds promising DB. Keeping fingers crossed for your DS.
It is not surprising that your S knows kids who prefer ROTC to the SA’s.
My S1 talked about the SA’s early on. I think he would have been very competitive for a slot but as he went through h.s. decided that with a long road of military life ahead of him, he woud rather do ROTC and enjoy regular college life first.
Now that he’s wearing the uniform and reporting for duty every day, I’m certain he is glad he made that decision. It’s a good thing there are several different routes to the same end for those wanting to serve.</p>
<p>I would definitely think that something is up with regards to the call from the college. Clearly without an application on file, something else (probably the PMS inquiring) is prompting this call from the college to your counseling office.</p>
<p>Battallions are clearly taking stock of their applicant lists, checking with admissions to see if these are go or nogo, and then prioritizing which appliants they will say yes to Cadet Command for.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t necessarily read a scholarship offer from just this activity, but clearly they like his application. Something to smile about.</p>