Reserve Service While Employed 2

[JTHudson]

My name is John Hudson. I'm currently a junior in college studying to be a civil engineer. I saw another thread similar to this, but it didn't quite answer my question as my situation is a bit different. If another thread satisfies my question, I apologize and would appreciate being directed to that thread.

When I graduate from college I am going to do my best to get a job with the Corps of Engineers. However, I want to join the Air Force reserves as well. I want to be a reserve Combat Rescue Officer. I looked and didn't find a comparable job in the Army Reserves (else I would elect for Army reserves), and this job is the one I really want to pursue. The training for this job requires 18-24 months of constant training.

My questions are:

1. Will I run into any complications with the Corps of Engineers for going Air Force Reserves instead of Army Reserves (the Corps of Engineers is in the Department of the Army)?
2. How will I go about getting trained? Should I just put my civilian engineering career on hold and go straight into reserves training after I graduate college, or should I attempt to work something out with my employer? I need your opinions on this.
3. Should I be worried about how the Corps of Engineers will react when it comes time for me to work 2 consecutive weeks for the reserves?

Thank you for all your help. I appreciate any advice you can give me. Also, I still have two years before I graduate, so this is not a decision with major time constraints on it, at least it isn't yet. I'm just trying to get ahead of the game, so I can know what course of action to take when the time comes.

 

[SlideRuleEra]

JTHudson -

Question #1: No problem at all.

Question #3: Again, no problem. As a reservist, even if you were called to extended active duty, that would be no problem.

Question #2: I'll look into this and get back with you here.


Are you in ROTC now?

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[JTHudson]

I am not in ROTC. I did not want to limit my options that much by joining ROTC as it requires a mandatory term of active duty service upon graduation. I received enough scholarship money that I did not need the ROTC college money. I understand that ROTC would have made it easier, but when I started college I wasn't sure if I wanted to join the military active duty or even the reserves, so I elected not to do ROTC. I'm just doing my best now to keep as high of a GPA as possible so that I can be a competitive applicant when I apply for OTS.

Not sure if it makes a difference, but I am a summer intern for the Corps of Engineers. That little bit of information might be meaningful, but if it isn't then just ignore it.

 

[SlideRuleEra]

JTH - What you want to do might be possible, but only within limits. The Corps on Engineers (COE) follows the US Federal Government's "Military Leave" policy. Fifteen days a year, with pay as a federal employee that is concurrent with military pay. After that, military pay is what you get. See this page on Federal Military Leave: Link
Perhaps the COE would hire you, then immediately allow you to take a 2 year unpaid "leave of absence"... but I doubt it. If they did, you should be able to return to the COE job (or an equivalent COE job). While you are with the COE as an intern, suggest that you look into the possibility with them.

Talk with an AF Reserve recruiter. You will have to attend and complete OTS, be commissioned, then be accepted into and complete the Combat Rescue Officer program while finding a suitable AF Reserve assignment. This aspect of your plan should be doable... but with a full time commitment (and military service obligation) on your part.

Before we go any further, are you willing to make that commitment?

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[JNieman]

Talk with an AF Reserve recruiter.

Write down his response and then immediately seek out someone who recently walked your desired path and see what the truth is.

_________________________________________
NX8.0, Solidworks 2014, AutoCAD, Enovia V5

 

[RobertHale]

I agree with SlideRuleEra about questions 1 & 3. Without ROTC as a commissioning source you are going to have to complete some time intensive training just for initial entry. I am more familiar with the Entry requirements for the Army but my sense is that they are similar. A little searching leads me to believe that you will need 9 weeks to commission and then your 18 months to get your "MOS", and that that period will be wholly and fully dedicated to establishing your initial competencies (read: no day job during this time). If you were talking about the Army, you could reduce the post-education training time by going into ROTC, taking some training over the summer and commissioning that way. I do not know if AFROTC offers this same option though. I have a few suggestions: [ol 1]
[li]Talk to a recruiter to be sure you know what your AF career path will be. You need to make sure they have a slot for you doing the job you want to do near to where you live. You may want to check with the AFROTC at your educational institution to find out about your entry options.[/li]
[li]Since you are interning at USACE, talk to HR about the options.[/li]
[/ol]

 

[JTHudson]

with a full time commitment (and military service obligation)

I understand the things you said prior to this quote, but I'm not quite sure what you mean by the quote above. By full time commitment, do you just mean that I would be training to become a Combat Rescue Officer like it was a full time job? Also, does military service obligation infer that I will be required to serve a contracted term of 4 or 6 years on active duty as if I were a part of the actual Air Force and not the reserves?

Maybe I am misunderstanding what you are saying, but it sounds like I will attend OTS, be commissioned, and complete the Combat Rescue Officer Program all as an active duty military member of the Air Force while I search for an AF Reserve job. If this is not correct, please clarify. If it is correct, what happens if a comparable/suitable reserve job is not found? Will I remain an active duty CRO?

Write down his response and then immediately seek out someone who recently walked your desired path and see what the truth is.

I have gotten that advice many times when it comes to talking to military recruiters. Unfortunately, I do not know anyone who is in my position, or even in a similar position. All my friends are either active duty military, or full on civilian.

 

[JTHudson]

I do not know if AFROTC offers this same option though

AFROTC does offer this option as well. However, in order to get into their POC (Professional Officer's Course), you must take the field training between sophomore and junior year. That's this summer for me, and I'm working full time. I will have to talk to the Major of the AFROTC detachment at University of Memphis, but I believe it is too late for me to join.

 

[debodine]

JTHudson:

I can offer a bit of information that may or may not help. I am not exactly sure what SlideRuleEra intended to say with "...full time committment..." but I can give you some status information about the MSO (military service obligation) and the reserve positions.

Keep in mind I retired from the USAF Reserve in 1992 so my info may be a bit dated.

In my day the MSO was 8 years. That meant for eight years after I joined, I was committed to being either active duty (in your case, for training), active reserve (reporting for duty as a reservist) or inactive reserve (meaning I was not required to report for duty but I was "on the books" and subject to recall at the behest of the USAF).

While on active reserve, you can be typically in either Category A or Category B. (There are other categories but these two are the most prevalent for reservists).

Catagory A: You assignment is with an established unit, typically a squadron that requires the specialty in which you trained. This is what most people think of for reserve duty and these positions are the typical "one weekend per month and two weeks per year". That was my category.

Category B: You are assigned to a position but not typically with an operational unit. The position is usually in an office, often at a headquarters unit. This category typically has a lot more flexibility in when you report for duty. Normally you work out your schedule with your supervisor and it is rarely limited to the "one weekend per month and two weeks per year". Category B seemed to be a good fit for a fair number of officers.

I hope this helps but as others have suggested, check with your recruiters for the most current load of BS. I say that because you will find that most everything you are told in the military except instructions from your direct chain of command will be BS, especially things said by recruiters. But most of the BS will not harm you. Recruiters are there to seek the needs of the service (as they should be) so they have a vested interest in steering you for the slot they need filled, not necessarily what you want.

debodine

 

[JTHudson]

Thank you for clarifying Debodine. Having an MSO does not really concern me that much as long as the only time I'm considered active duty is for training. If I can do active duty for 2 years to train then do active reserve for the rest of the MSO then that is A-OK with me. Honestly I currently plan on doing it longer than 8 years. If I had my way (not likely to happen because military gets the final say-so), I'd do active duty for 2 years to train, then do active reserve until i'm 35 or 40. Then I'd go back to being full-time civilian.

My main concern is me having difficulty finding a civilian engineering job after going through training since I will be 2 years out of college. I'm worried I'll have to start at the bottom all over again, where if I looked for a job right out of college, it'd be easier to find a job.

It's at this point that most people say "why don't you just stay active duty until you hit career serviceman status then retire and find a civilian job? What you want to do for the reserves puts you close to career status. Why don't you just stay active?". I've thought about that, but I really don't want to move every 4-6 years when I get a new MSO.

 

[SlideRuleEra]

JTH - Good advice from all. The commitment that I was referring to was the 2 years of OTS and CRO training. You need to find out about any further obligation beyond that 2 years of training... I expect that there will be a commitment. This may surprise you, but the AFR is somewhat of a Do-It-Yourself program. As an officer you are not going to be lead around and told what to do next - its up to you to find out and make it happen.

Like debodine, my time in the AFR was a while back... retired in 1992, also. I was a Category B reservist. Your preferred career field is virtually guaranteed to Category A. You may find that you participate in a lot more than 2 weeks a year. Doing this with no active time, as background, will probably be daunting. After commissioning through AFROTC, I did have the advantage of 4 years active duty before transferring to the AFR.

I really like RobertHale's advice, look into AFROTC. Since you are studying engineering, the Air Force may work with you to complete the program. Yes, you will have to go to summer "camp" and be in the ROTC program for 2 years... but perhaps you can get an "educational" delay, for some graduate work in college, to allow time to complete ROTC. Often the Air Force will take measures to "get" engineers that they won't do for most other college students. You will get the mandatory commitment. If you still don't want make some kind of a commitment, I believe your (military) choices are limited.

On the upside, if you do make the commitment, and complete active military service, transferring to the reserves should be easy. Also, if you go to work for the COE at that time, you can pay and get credit for your military service. Look into the details.

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[TheTick]

I really don't get why you're wasting so much energy here without having first talked to a recruiter. It will save everyone a lot of time if you do.

Make some tracks to someone who actually has the answer for real.

Your "dream job" may not even be available for reservists. It is almost certainly not available without full time commitment to training.

 

[SlideRuleEra]

Agree with TheTick.

My main concern is me having difficulty finding a civilian engineering job after going through training since I will be 2 years out of college. I'm worried I'll have to start at the bottom all over again, where if I looked for a job right out of college, it'd be easier to find a job.

Let me see if I understand this:

1. You want to start an engineering civilian job soon after graduation.
2. Immediately take a 2 year (unpaid) leave of absence from this job for military training (not active duty).
3. As a reservist, work in a military career field that has little or no engineering content. No commitments required.
4. Return to the engineering civilian job as though you now have 2 years of engineering experience in that field.
5. Continue participation with the Active AF Reserve, with the expectation that you will keep the same military reserve job for 20 years.

In all sincerity, I believe this equation has too many unknowns to be solved.

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[JTHudson]

Thank you everyone who replied and helped me out. I will get in touch with the Major of the AFROTC detachment and see if i have any options. I know my college has an advanced masters program that only takes a year to complete, so maybe I can negotiate getting the AF to pay for that by letting me do ROTC for my senior year and year of masters school then signing for active duty. I really wish I had just joined ROTC when i started college. I considered it, but decided against it. Now i'm having to finagle a way of doing it. I will consider going active duty for a while, then transfering to AFR like SlideRuleEra did. At that point I'd also be able to claim veteran preference when applying for the Corps of Engineers. Of course assuming I don't decide to make a career out of the military.

I'll look into my options. As JNieman said, I talk to someone to see what the truth is after i talk to a recruiter (the detachment leader is just a college recruiter). Since it will not be engineering related, do you guys know of a place I can talk to someone who has been through a similar situation since I don't know anyone in my personal day-to-day life who has experience anything like this. I don't want to open another thread for that because that's not the purpose of this forum.

 

[SlideRuleEra]

JTH - Ok, that approach sound more realistic.

Help yourself, use the internet to find leads. Googling on "Combat Rescue Officer" has lots of pertinent information. For example:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Air_Force_Combat_Rescue_Officer

Contact bases that host Special Operations Units, or appropriate Air Combat Command bases. Tell a recruiter to "make this happen", if your request is informed and reasonable, it will.

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[JTHudson]

I apologize, somehow what I was thinking did not transfer well to what I typed.

I will go to training right after graduation, not begin a civilian job. Of course, after I iron out the details and get a clear path towards what i'm working towards. I will be doing this as active duty. Following my training, I will serve out the rest of my time as an active duty Combat Rescue Officer. At this point I will decide whether I want to make the military my career, or if i want to get out and go to a civilian job. If I go to a civilian job (most likely the Corps of Engineers), I will transition to the AFR.

I understand that the above paragraph is not exactly what I was saying earlier, but from what I have gathered from your advice, I feel like this is the way I have to proceed if I want to give this the greatest chance for success possible. I plan on getting in contact with the AFROTC Major at my school and schedulng a meeting with him asap.

I keep playing catch-up because i'm a message behind haha. Thanks for all your help though.

 

[hendersdc]

I was reserve all through college. Had to drop out in the middle for deployment and then went again immediately after graduation. This put a 1 year gap between getting my degree and looking for a job. It was a bad time in the entry level engineering job market (2007) but I found a good engineering job within 6 mos. No one had any issues with that length of time between school and first eng job. I wouldn't think your 2 years would be much different, it's not like you were up in Aspen being a ski bum or anything and a lot of employers like the military experience.

My main concern with your situation is that you have a very specific and not very common job in mind with the Air Force. I don't know if things work differently in that branch but the way it worked in the Marines for officers going active duty is the officer class at the end of their basic school was ranked and divided into 3rds. # 1 in the top third got to pick his job from the list of needs, # 1 from the middle third, # 1 from the bottom third, #2 from the top third, etc down the line. This was done to try and more evenly spread the quality of officers across the different MOS' but it also meant a lot of what job you got was luck/ least-bad-option. Some people got flight guarantees before receiving their commission but that still left quite a few options for where they would actually end up.

I can only speak to the reserves from an enlisted perspective. You are basically recruited to fill a specific open billet at a specific unit. For me the only unit close was artillery so I was limited to the jobs needed to support artillery. I assume the number of reserve units that have open billets for combat rescue officers is pretty slim so you will likely need to relocate close to their base or find one that is willing to foot the bill to fly you in for training every month.

Good luck and I hope everything works out for you!

 

[IRstuff]

If anything, your service might guilt someone into hiring you... ;-)

TTFN
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