Thread: The challenge of all challenges...

Is getting my Soldiers to take college courses and take (FREE!!) CLEP/DSST/ECE exams. I don't get why it's so hard to motivate these guys but it is. I have had some impact but it took so much time and effort to get people off their butts. Have any other NCOs or Officers here had better success with this? Any ideas that help motivate these troops?

Originally Posted by Professor_Adam

Is getting my Soldiers to take college courses and take (FREE!!) CLEP/DSST/ECE exams. I don't get why it's so hard to motivate these guys but it is. I have had some impact but it took so much time and effort to get people off their butts. Have any other NCOs or Officers here had better success with this? Any ideas that help motivate these troops?

Troops (junior enlisted) most often won't be motivated to get their college degree unless they are ambitious and have a desire to do things like become an officer or NCO.

The reason being
(1) although it might translate into things like promotion points a troop will make far more money by getting married and having more children (BAH and BAS)
(2) its time consuming if you don't enjoy it,
(3) you can easily survive in the military without one and make a good amount of money and even retire with a full pension without ever getting one,
(4) enlisted atmosphere is many times very macho and not very education oriented,
(5) you get college credit for job training in the military (even if you don't ever get a degree)
(6) a large number of enlisted never had a desire to go to college. For those who did they would go and simply go to ROTC.

my humble opinion...

Originally Posted by creationstory

Troops (junior enlisted) most often won't be motivated to get their college degree unless they are ambitious and have a desire to do things like become an officer or NCO.

The reason being
(1) although it might translate into things like promotion points a troop will make far more money by getting married and having more children (BAH and BAS)
(2) its time consuming if you don't enjoy it,
(3) you can easily survive in the military without one and make a good amount of money and even retire with a full pension without ever getting one,
(4) enlisted atmosphere is many times very macho and not very education oriented,
(5) you get college credit for job training in the military (even if you don't ever get a degree)
(6) a large number of enlisted never had a desire to go to college. For those who did they would go and simply go to ROTC.

my humble opinion...

Your observations are spot on. However, in my MOS (the people I work with) you CANNOT get promoted and retire without college. For instance the cutoff score for promotion to staff sergeant as a 92F is 798 points. That means you need to have 67 SH of college to get promoted. Even with a military eval, most Soldiers in that rank will only have about 12 to 18 credits.

We have some Soldiers in our MOS throughout the Army who are still E-5's nearing retirement because they don't have two years of college credit (67 SH).

Originally Posted by Professor_Adam

Your observations are spot on. However, in my MOS (the people I work with) you CANNOT get promoted and retire without college. For instance the cutoff score for promotion to staff sergeant as a 92F is 798 points. That means you need to have 67 SH of college to get promoted. Even with a military eval, most Soldiers in that rank will only have about 12 to 18 credits.

We have some Soldiers in our MOS throughout the Army who are still E-5's nearing retirement because they don't have two years of college credit (67 SH).

i was aware that there were situations where could not get promoted without enough college credits, but i was not aware that you could not retire without enough points.. can you tell me more about this.. or provide links...

Originally Posted by creationstory

i was aware that there were situations where could not get promoted without enough college credits, but i was not aware that you could not retire without enough points.. can you tell me more about this.. or provide links...

Just a guess, but I think he's referring to the fact that the RCP for a SGT/E-5 is 15 years so you wouldn't be able to retire without enough points to make cutoff for SSG.

Originally Posted by Joel Felberg

Just a guess, but I think he's referring to the fact that the RCP for a SGT/E-5 is 15 years so you wouldn't be able to retire without enough points to make cutoff for SSG.

How long can a e 4 stay in the army before getting kicked out for not making e 5? - Yahoo! Answers

How long can a e 4 stay in the army before getting kicked out for not making e 5?
2 months ago

Report Abuse


Baghdad Betty
Best Answer - Chosen by Asker
The term you are referring to is RCP - Retention Control Point.
For SPC/CPL, the RCP is 10 years of Active Federal Service.
For SPC/CPL Promotable, the RCP is 15 years of Active Federal Service.
For SGT, the RCP is 15 years and SGT Promotable is 20 years.

Reference:
AR 601-280, Table 3-1 Retention Control Points
2 months ago


Retention Control Points


The Retention Control Point (RCP) is basically an "up or out" measure. Each rank in the Army has a RCP. A Soldier holding a certain rank can't exceed the RCP for that rank, by more than 29 days.

They must be promoted or selected for promotion for the next higher grade prior to reaching their current rank RCP.


In the table below are the current RCP's for each rank: RANK RCP
PVT-PFC 8
CPL/SPC 10
CPL/SPC (Promotable) 15
SGT 15
SGT (Promotable) 20
SSG 22
SSG (Promotable) 24
SFC 24
SFC (Promotable) 26
1SG/MSG 26
1SG/MSG (Promotable) 30
CSM/SGM 30

High Year of Tenure

Air Force (active and reserves) HYT


E-4 - 12 years
E-5 - 20 years
E-6 - 24 years
E-7 - 26 years
E-8 - 28 years
E-9 - 30 years

Army (active and AGR) RCP, Effective Nov 08


E-1 to E-3 - 3 years
E-4 - 10 years
E-4 (Promotable) - 15 years
E-5 - 15 years
E-5 (Promotable) - 20 years
E-6 - 23 years
E-6 (Promotable) - 26 years
E-7 - 26 years
E-7 (Promotable) - 29 years
E-8 - 29 years
E-8 (Promotable) - 32 years
E-9 - 32 years

The Army has also changed the maximum age an enlisted member can remain on active duty from 55 years to 62 years.

Navy (Active & Reserves)


E-4 - 10 years
*E-5 - 14 years (20 years for Reserves)
E-6 - 20 years
E-7 - 24 years
E-8 - 26 years
E-9 - 30 years

Note: The Navy changed E-5 HYT from 20 years to 14 years, effective July 1, 2005. However, sailors with more than ten years of service as of July 1, 2005 may remain in the service until they are retirement eligible (20 years of service). For details, see NAVADMIN 056/05.

Navy (Reserves, effective Jan 2006):


E-3 - 12 years

E-4 - 14 years
E-5 - 22 years
E-6 - 24 years
E-7 - 24 years
E-8 - 26 years
E-9 - 30 years

Marine Corps (Active) HYT


E-4 - 8 years
E-5 - 13 years
E-6 - 20 years
E-7 - 24 years
E-8 - 26 years
E-9 - 30 years
Note: An E-5 who has been passed over twice for promotion to E-6 may be separated at the end of their current enlistment, even if they have less than 13 years of service. An E-6 who has been passed over twice for promotion to E-7 may be separated at the end of their current enlistment, even if they have less than 20 years of service. An E-7 or E-8 may exceed 20 years of service only if they have not been passed over twice for promotion.

Marine Corps (Reserves) HYT


E-3 - 10 years
E-4 - 12 years
E-5 - 20 years
E-6 - 24 years
E-7 - 26 years
E-8 - 28 years
E-9 - 30 years

Coast Guard (active and reserves) HYT


E-1 - Cannot reenlist
E-2 - 4 years
E-3/E-4 - 7 years active Coast Guard service or 10 years active military service, whichever is greater.
E-5 - 20 years
E-6 - 22 years
E-7 - 26 years
E-8 - 28 years
E-9 - 30 years

Creationstory,
Yes that post is good. However, there is only one minor change that just happened two months ago. The Army recently changed RCP for SSG to 23 years (up from 22) and SFC went up as well. Just wanted to clarify that.
I work in retention so we deal with this all the time. When a Soldier decides reenlist "indefinite" it brings their ETS out to their RCP date. For instance, a SSG with 15 years of service who reenlists indefinite will have a new ETS that would put him at 23 years of service.
However, you can still request retirement at 20 years. Many of my friends have been held over though another year or two since the Iraq war began. I have seen very few SSG or SFC getting out at exactly 20 years now but that will likely change as Iraq is drawn down.

We were talking about this during a NCOPD a while back and the consensus was that if Joe doesn't want the rank bad enough to go get it, that's on him. I have personally talked to all of my guys about college and how to test out of a degree. Only two took me up on it. And only one had the follow through to last more than a few months.

That one guy... He racked up like 40 something credits in Iraq alone and had enough points to make his E5.

The others.... They work for him.

You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink.

Originally Posted by HawkGuy

We were talking about this during a NCOPD a while back and the consensus was that if Joe doesn't want the rank bad enough to go get it, that's on him. I have personally talked to all of my guys about college and how to test out of a degree. Only two took me up on it. And only one had the follow through to last more than a few months.

That one guy... He racked up like 40 something credits in Iraq alone and had enough points to make his E5.

The others.... They work for him.

You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink.

Agreed but I'm determined to have an impact. I know that some of these guys will look back on this time and realized they missed out on a great opportunity. I have had a very good influence on three or four NCOs but the younger joes are a tougher sell. I just try to lead by example and help motivate them as much as possible. I love to see the others guys succeed and get excited when they start finally racking up the promotion points.

That's a good attitude to have. I don't know how you can get to the younger guys. That's a tough one. Most of them just want to drink, go out and drink, or hang out in the barracks and drink. I know I was like that as a PV2-SPC haha.

Maybe as an encouragement to the younger guys set aside some time at work to study and reward the ones who pass. Or you could give briefings to all the company's in the BN. You never know who might be interested. If you get the CoC on board, maybe you could get the guys who knock out a certain number of credits a 4 day pass or something.

I don't think you can really force them to study without having them resent it though. Maybe start out with FEMA's and show them how easy it actually is, then move on to CLEP and DSST.