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OTS News: Going Officer (AF Times Article)
Contributed by class5kayaker on Friday, December 23 @ 07:44:50 EST
Topic: Latest News
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Thinking of landing a commission? Here’s what you need to know before you switch
By Bruce Rolfsen
Times staff writer
If it hadn’t been for an officer’s urging 12 years ago, Capt. Jeff Pixley might be loading bombs onto jets instead of flying them.
In 1993, Pixley was a senior airman assigned to the bomb dump at Spangdahlem Air Base, Germany.
A second lieutenant took Pixley aside and asked what the airman wanted to do with his career. He told her he wanted to be a pilot.
Her reply? “What are you going to do about it?”
Six years later, Pixley pinned on his pilot’s wings. He’s now an AT-38C Talon instructor pilot assigned to Moody Air Force Base, Ga.
While the Air Force is kicking out thousands of lieutenants over the next few years, the service is continuing to encourage enlisted airmen who can achieve academic requirements and have leadership potential to seek commissions through ROTC, Officer Training School or the Air Force Academy.
“The opportunities are still there,” said Col. Steven Wayne, commander of the Air Force ROTC program headquartered at Maxwell Air Force Base, Ala.
In fact, some officer career fields, including nursing and special tactics, continue to have unfilled slots, said Lt. Col. Tom Haines, chief of the officer accession branch of the Air Force Recruiting Service at Lackland Air Force Base, Texas.
Of the Air Force’s approximately 72,400 officers, about 20 percent were once enlisted, according to Air Force Personnel Center numbers.
Those former enlisted airmen — and a handful of soldiers, sailors and Marines — aren’t spread evenly across career fields.
Just 4 percent of the Air Force’s 3,350 fighter pilots are prior-enlisted. But 38 percent of the Air Force’s maintenance officers have enlisted experience. Other fields with higher than average numbers of prior-enlisteds include: special tactics, 35 percent; security forces, 30 percent; communications, 37 percent; and clinical nursing, 31 percent.
Cuts to the Air Force officer corps mean an airman who hopes to make the jump will have to do some more planning — smarter and sooner — to make it happen.
And enlisted airmen who make officer are vulnerable to the same cutbacks other officers face.
However, Wayne said, the fact that they had the dedication to earn a commission is a good indication that they will do well as officers and likely won’t be among those who will be asked to leave.
“We aren’t cutting the cream,” Wayne said.
CHANCES DESPITE CUTS
Last fall, OTS expected to commission about 1,060 second lieutenants from enlisted and civilian applicants in the coming year, Haines said. As efforts to reduce manning took hold, the goal was cut to 720. For fiscal 2006, the goal is down to 485 and likely will be about the same for fiscal 2007.
As for ROTC, the Air Force has cut the number of graduating cadets, both prior-enlisted and civilian students, from 2,400 annually to 2,000, Wayne said.
Less than 10 percent of graduating cadets will come from enlisted ROTC programs, according to Air Force figures.
In ROTC and OTS, there is less emphasis on commissioning officers for nontechnical jobs such as personnel, services and security forces.
At OTS in 2006, only 73 of the 485 positions are for nontechnical career fields, Haines said. The year before at OTS, only 60 of the 500 airmen who submitted packages for nontechnical positions were approved.
By percentage, an airman has a better chance at landing an aircrew position. In 2005, 84 percent of the enlisted airmen seeking OTS commissions as navigators were selected. The selection rate for OTS pilots was 63 percent and 71 percent for OTS air battle managers.
Aircrew commissions also are an alternative for airmen in ROTC programs who don’t have science or engineering degrees, Wayne said.
ROTC pilot selection boards look at candidates’ leadership records, aircrew qualification test scores and overall grade-point averages. An ROTC cadet isn’t penalized if he majored in history instead of aeronautical engineering, Wayne said.
Another option is seeking a commission in a medical career field. Haines, for example, spent nine years as an enlisted medical technician before earning a commission as a Medical Service Corps officer.
In 2005, the Air Force recruited only 753 of the 1,123 health professionals it needed. During 2006, the Air Force Recruiting Service aims to sign up about 350 nurses.
To encourage airmen seeking nursing degrees, ROTC offers scholarships; OTS recruits prior-enlisted nurses and offers incentives that help some recruits pay off their school costs.
DEDICATION REQUIRED
For enlisted airmen, there are three basic routes to a commission:
• ROTC. An airman will spend up to four years at a university with the opportunity of earning a commission upon graduation.
• Officer Training School. An airman can earn a commission after obtaining a bachelor’s degree on his own.
• The Air Force Academy. Several dozen enlisted airmen are accepted as cadets each year.
Talk with officers who made the jump from the enlisted ranks, and they’ll tell you stories of taking chances, planning ahead and not getting discouraged at first or second rejections.
They’ll also tell you that their enlisted experience gave them the discipline and maturity to earn their bachelor’s degrees and commissions.
“It’s not easy. It’s a stick-to-it thing,” said recently retired Col. Ed Felker, who spent 13 years as an enlisted munitions airman before being accepted into OTS in 1977 on his third try.
The move often begins with an airman’s realization that he is ready for a change.
UNIQUE CHALLENGES
Capt. Shamana Stevens, a nurse now studying at the Air Force Institute of Technology, was an enlisted electronics technician when she realized in the early 1990s that a career spent fixing circuit boards didn’t interest her.
“I knew I wouldn’t sleep well with that as a profession. ... I realized I wasn’t into machines,” Stevens recalled.
When Stevens’ four-year enlistment ended at Mountain Home Air Force Base, Idaho, she knew she wanted to be a nurse. But getting from the enlisted ranks to her second lieutenant bars took determination and creative financing.
First, she joined the Idaho Air Guard as a cook to stay in the Air Force and become eligible for Guard tuition assistance.
After being accepted into Boise State University’s nursing program, Stevens used GI Bill and Guard benefits, scholarships, and student loans to pay for courses.
When she wasn’t in class, working civilian medical technician jobs or with the Guard, Stevens was helping her husband, also a guardsman and nursing student, raise their two young boys.
Although Stevens was confident a commission would be available when she graduated, given the nationwide nursing shortage, she stayed in contact with her Boise recruiter and got a written promise of a commission months before she accepted her diploma.
For 1st Lt. Rodger Jennrich, today a special tactics officer with the 720th Special Tactics Group at Hurlburt Field, Fla., the road to second lieutenant’s bars meant staying on active duty.
Jennrich, who was an enlisted combat controller in the mid-1990s, earned college credits as a part-time student between deployments and keeping up with his wife and three kids.
In 2001, Jennrich graduated from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University with an aerospace degree.
Jennrich obtained a guaranteed Officer Training School slot before he had his bachelor’s degree in hand. At first, the Air Force wanted to commission Jennrich as an air traffic control officer, but with persistence and support from his old combat controller commanders, he got his first choice of being a special tactics officer, overseeing some of the same troops he had served with as an enlisted airman.
Capt. Terry Tyree, who flies KC-10 Extender tankers out of McGuire Air Force Base, N.J., advised airmen not to give up on their dream career field.
Tyree earned his commission in 1999 after graduating — at nearly 28 years old — from Embry-Riddle through ROTC and after serving as an enlisted repair technician aboard the E-3 Airborne Warning and Control System.
He wanted to be a pilot or navigator but was told he was too old.
A few weeks later, the policy changed and Tyree earned his navigator wings.
Even then, Tyree didn’t give up his goal of becoming a pilot. While serving at Ramstein Air Base, Germany, as a C-130 Hercules navigator, Tyree put in his application for pilot training.
In 2003, Tyree was accepted into the pilot program. But at age 32, it took a waiver.
Tyree believed he got the pilot slot and age waiver by proving he wanted to be a leader in his C-130 squadron. There he served in several staff jobs, such as mobility, life support and executive officer.
“It goes back to working to do what you want to do,” Tyree said.
EARLY ADVANTAGE
Once a prior-enlisted airman earns his second lieutenant bars, he often stands out, either because he is the only 30-something lieutenant in his squadron or because someone notices his enlisted service ribbons.
In some career fields, prior-enlisted officers can find themselves starting with more responsibility than a less-experienced officer.
Jennrich, as a second lieutenant, oversaw the training of student combat controllers, a position that wouldn’t have been given to a lieutenant who was new to special operations.
Lt. Col. Ray Corcoran, who spent four years as a KC-135 crew chief before becoming a maintenance officer 20 years ago, cautioned that the prior-enlisted edge wears off.
“After the second year, those advantages go away,” said Corcoran, who now serves at Ogden Air Logistics Center in Utah.
Even so, that credibility early on helps when confronting the challenges of being a new lieutenant.
“Word gets out fast on the flight line that you’re a prior-enlisted guy,” Pixley said. “The cool thing is, they know — ‘You’ve been in my shoes.’”
Bruce Rolfsen covers training issues. He can be reached at (703) 750-8647 or brolfse@airforcetimes.com.
EXPERT'S 7 TIPS FOR SUCCESS:
Want to improve your chances of getting a commission? We talked to the experts and identified seven hints:
1. Get references. Don’t be afraid to seek the recommendation of senior officers who know you. Their opinion may carry more weight with review boards.
2. Be persistent. Keep checking with your base education office for details on GI Bill benefits, ROTC programs and which available officer career fields are best suited to your skills.
3. Pick the right base. Bases near cities, such as Langley Air Force Base, Va., or Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, offer more college options. Not in a great location right now? Then maybe it’s time to do that one-year tour in Korea, which gives you better follow-on stateside assignment choices.
4. Involve your family. For married airmen, seeking a commission requires sacrifices from the entire family. Those sacrifices could be a wife working full-time while her husband is an ROTC cadet or the husband taking care of the kids while his wife goes to school part-time and works full-time as an airman. Bring them into the decision-making process.
5. Check your work. Make certain there are no mistakes in your application package. Since there are no in-person interviews with ROTC and Officer Training School boards, your package has to speak for you.
6. Polish your record. If your high school grades are lacking, build up your résumé with good grades from community college courses before submitting an ROTC package.
7. Get the right degree. Seek a degree the Air Force wants. More doors are open to airmen who earn degrees in engineering, high-demand foreign languages and medical specialties than are open to airmen who major in English, for example.
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