enlisting while in college? good or bad?

[*42*]

If I were you I would enlist now. There is a wait between the time you sign the papers and when you actually get your basic/tech school training dates. Flight engineer sounds like a great job and you get more benefits, such a $5000 bonus or $20,000 in loan repayments ($2,500/year) in addition to state and other GI bill benefits. I am under the impression that if you enlist, and they send you to a long tech school, you may not get selected right away because you're valuable to them as an engineer. Tell the recruiter what your goals are, and they should be able to work with you to find something that's right.

Here is some useful information before you enlist:

- You can transfer out of the unit by filling out a DoD form 368.

-USERRA and some new laws passed since 9/11 protect you from getting fired, kicked out of school, or harassed by your creditors if you are called to active duty. In fact, if you are called up while you are in school, they are supposed to give you all your tuition money back. Though I can't say for sure whether it would work in your situation, it's something you could fall back on.

-My tax accountant told me today that your commuting expenses are not a tax deduction unless you itemize, and the sum of what you itemize exceeds the amount of a standard deduction ($4,550). So, unless you give a couple thousand to charities every year, you won't be able to write off the commuting expenses.

-In addition to educational benefits, with the GI bill can help you finance your first home loan with no down payment. You get your GI bill certificate when you finish basic training and tech school.

 

[Hootie9750]

Big thanks to everyone who responded with their input. After talking to as many people who would talk to me I have changed my mind from wanting to enlist as a loadmaster or boom operator and having to either move or commute 5-6 hours from where I am now, to where I am going to enlist as either a crew chief or an intelligence job in my local f-16 unit that is under 2 hours away.
I am leaning towards intelligence because I am not a mechanical genius. Also I have been told not to enlist because I have less than 2 years to graduate, and that enlisting will obviously push me back another semester or two. A couple people also mentioned FE, but that is not a job that can be enlisted in right off the bat. Again if anyone else has anything to the topic of enlisting I would love to hear it.

 

[Big Duke Six]

Can't go wrong there...

Hootie,

I think you'll enjoy life as a crew chief - you will be right there in the thick of things and will have a ball on deployments with the fighters. Do you need to go to maintenance school for that specialty? I thought crew chiefs were mechanics first...

Anyway, I know going to basic and tech school while in college is a problem, but it will really help your efforts. That was the beauty of POL - a short tech school after basic and I was back home for Fall semester. Did you look into that as an option? There is plenty of potential to get "exposure" there - on deployments or exercises there is real close coordination between the POL (fuels) people, maintenance, supply and ops. I volunteered to work on the planning of several exercises and ended up being on the ADVON teams and dispatching for the POL section on some ORI's because of it. Believe me, that is as much exposure under stress as you could want, but you could do it well and get several LOR's from several O-5's and above that will have seen or heard about you in action. In my unit anyway, no one was volunteering for those things so it was greatly appreciated and really went a long way for me, I think. It may be different at your unit though - those are just my experiences. Anyway, just more to think about.

OK, I'll stop now.....
Duke

 

[bssthound]

BD6 said:

I volunteered to work on the planning of several exercises and ended up being on the ADVON teams and dispatching for the POL section on some ORI's because of it.

In my unit anyway, no one was volunteering for those things so it was greatly appreciated and really went a long way for me, I think.

That pretty much sums it up. Dive into whatever you're doing, don't come up for air until it's done right, then look for something else to do and you'll go a long way. I don't care if your dad plays golf with the Wing Commander or your uncle fishes with the DO, if you show yourself to be head and shoulders above the rest of the pack you'll get a lot more consideration than those who're running with the rest of the pack.

Best of luck, you've the potential for a great future.