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It's a challenging program that is rewarding if you're willing to get interested in the material and learn as much as you can as in depth as you can. It also pays well, advances fast and gives you good employment opportunities outside the navy. Additionally, it's a very politically charged program. Be prepared to do things that don't make a lot of sense because they're what the program need you to do. You're going to hate that aspect of the job, in fact it's what most people complain about. If you're willing to deal with a challenging program with a good number of standing orders that don't make a whole lot of sense and having to deal with severe repercussions for what would be considered small errors in other fields you'll enjoy it. Otherwise, hold out and get your negotiator to assign you a different rate.
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Apr 18, 2012 13:07
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If you score well and sign up for nuke, you are dumb. If you score well and sign up for oh I dunno, pool boy? They got those maybe. Or I dunno, shop, sign up to be a store keep, you are less dumb.
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Apr 18, 2012 21:40
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I've been pretty miserable for the past decade but managed to get a degree and am now interviewing for jobs that pay very well. I don't regret it now that there's light at the end of the tunnel.
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Apr 18, 2012 23:01
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KetTarma posted:I've been pretty miserable for the past decade but managed to get a degree and am now interviewing for jobs that pay very well. I don't regret it now that there's light at the end of the tunnel. This pretty much sums it all up. The job is painful. Deployment sucks in a way hard to relate. The training is grueling and never truly stops. But once its over and done with the benefits are significant. If you choose to go in and suck it up, avoiding the traps and lazy easier jobs, then you can open a lot of doors outside in the real world. And yes, many of those doors can be opened by other means. But if your considering enlistment then you clearly cant afford to go those more conventional education routes. That or you are a monumental idiot who shouldnt be let outdoors. There are easier jobs in the navy but none that pay larger return on the time invested.
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Apr 19, 2012 11:59
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KetTarma posted:I've been pretty miserable for the past decade but managed to get a degree and am now interviewing for jobs that pay very well. I don't regret it now that there's light at the end of the tunnel. This is pretty much it. I didn't really enjoy my time in the Navy. I do enjoy my $150,000/yr job with no degree 5 years later though. Can't find many 6 year college programs that will do that for you. And looking back now, it was never really the job that I didn't like, it was the people I worked for, and I think that's probably a problem all over the Navy.
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Apr 20, 2012 04:01
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Yeah. I enjoyed taking poo poo apart and getting my hands dirty. What I didn't enjoy was waiting around all loving day (especially after duty), "just in case" the engineer approved that work.
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Apr 20, 2012 16:42
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I've been looking at applying for the Navy's NUPOC program for about a year and a half now, and I'm to the point that my application is about to be screened to approve me to interview in Washington, D.C. I finished my master's degree in math with a 4.0, so I'm not worried about my chances to interview at least. What I'm curious about is what to expect should I make it into the program. What I've found from non-recruiter sources were pretty vague - that the academic program is extremely rigorous but no details on how much work to expect in or out of the classroom. From what I can tell in this thread, it seems like most of you worked the enlisted side. How does that differ from the officer side? I'd also like to know what I would be doing depending on the different tracks - NR engineer, surface, and sub (I'm not trying for instructor because I've been teaching for a few years already). The only information I found on this is what little there is on the Navy's website. Once you finished with the initial commitment, did you stay in longer? What other employment opportunities did you have post-NUPOC? Even those of you without a degree seem like you're doing really well. What do you think would have been the right path to take, looking back on the choices you did make? Thanks in advance.
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Jun 17, 2012 18:44
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The only thing I can really tell you is that if you have a master's in math you're plenty smart enough for the program, its just the volume of stuff you have to learn(often verbatim) is the challenge. Also, surface nuke officers all do tours as SWOs(?) before going to nuke school, whereas submarine officers do not. I can't really add anything else since I was on the enlisted side, there is a nuke officer(subs) who posts here occasionally but I can't remember his name.....he'd be your best bet :/ e: Oh wait I keep forgetting Cerekk is a nuke officer now 0_o e2: The other officer is Manawski, you might try PMing him because I haven't seen him around in awhile genderstomper58 fucked around with this message at 19:04 on Jun 17, 2012 |
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Jun 17, 2012 18:59
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The human resources officer I tapped for STA-21 boards turned out to be prior enlisted. He got out, went to school with the GI bill, got accepted for NUPOC for one of the teacher jobs, and then lat transferred to HR.
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Jun 17, 2012 19:41
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JulianD posted:I've been looking at applying for the Navy's NUPOC program for about a year and a half now, and I'm to the point that my application is about to be screened to approve me to interview in Washington, D.C. I finished my master's degree in math with a 4.0, so I'm not worried about my chances to interview at least. I've trained about 200 officers so far so I think I can chime in a fact or two... The academic program is nothing like what you've faced. It is all fairly easy material but it is at an extraordinary pace. Imagine about 7 hours of lectures per day 5 days a week. There are no review days or refresher material. Every hour is new material. You are expected to memorize everything relevant in your spare time. Everything is classified so your "homework" is all done in the secure building affectionately called "the Rickover" where you have all of your classes. Do this for the better part of a year. Your college experience will not significantly help you. EEs still have some trouble applying all of the electrical concepts to real life, MEs still have to learn how mechanical systems work, NEs are generally pretty well off on the theory but still have to apply everything. Math majors will have an easy time with the math sections but even the officer course material doesn't go above differential equations. Officers don't fail out often because you're generally more mature and have a good technical background to fall back on.. but don't expect a cakewalk either. Prototype training is all hands on. It is high speed and high stress at all times. Within a year of joining, you'll be giving orders in a nuclear reactor plant to other students. Behind every student will be an instructor with their hand ready to stop you from doing the wrong thing or countermand the wrong order. I've seen (and caused) numerous officer students to break down crying because of the stress. I say this to warn you that you might be the guy that has a dozen people staring at you waiting for you to give the correct order to combat a (simulated) reactor problem. Several of them will have stop watches and grade sheets in their hand. One of them will be quizing you nonstop on equipment setpoints, the design basis behind the setpoint, and where to find the procedure for operating it. As I said, high intensity. I rarely deal with NR engineers. Sorry, no data. They work at NAVSEA08 so google that and maybe you'll find something. The "nuke officer instructors" are strongly disliked. They teach at Nuke school without having actually been a nuke. They basically recite powerpoints for students. Teaching at nuke school (not prototype) is the easiest job in the nuclear community and highly sought after as a duty assignment. These guys take the "break" that an actual sailor/officer could be having between deployments.. and they still bitch about their jobs! Nuke sub/surface officers are pretty similar. All sub officers are nukes except for the supply officer.. so look at a surface ship and think "what do officers do there?" and apply it to a submarine. Submarines suck. The pay is excellent though and the lifestyle has a lot less "military" than the surface to make up for the high suck factor. Theyre cramped, smelly, more dangerous, less amenities, and generally have much longer workdays.. but you can wear sneakers and grow a beard because no one cares. Surface officers act as a division officer on a non-nuke, then go through nuke school, do division officer on a carrier, then be a department head on a non-nuke, then department head on a nuke, then CO of a non-nuke, then Reactor Officer of a carrier, then go off to do something in Washington DC. That being said, few officers stay in past their initial commitment. The nuclear lifestyle is miserable. I haven't had an off day in 22 days and work about 98 hours a week on average right now. My shift officer works longer hours than me. Heh. The jobs on the outside for nuke officers and enlisted are amazing. I know many people that make over six figures. I personally have turned down a job offer that paid 105k per year because I wanted to go back to school and finish out an electrical engineering degree.
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Jun 18, 2012 01:10
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I'm a brilliant moron who should have gone into Navy nuclear poo poo in college but I got a scholarship and let people talk me out of it even though it sounded great. Then I went to law school because I'm, again, a loving moron. I decided to stop spinning my wheels, but my question is should i enlist or officer? I don't have a ton of leadership experience, and my college degree ended up being in linguistics. Should I just call a recruiter? Harold Fjord fucked around with this message at 23:20 on Jun 21, 2012 |
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Jun 21, 2012 23:16
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really e: Was thinking I was in the recruiting thread but I think it still applies. terrez fucked around with this message at 23:28 on Jun 21, 2012 |
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Jun 21, 2012 23:23
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Nevvy Z posted:
No lol
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Jun 21, 2012 23:26
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Nevvy Z posted:I'm a brilliant moron who should have gone into Navy nuclear poo poo in college but I got a scholarship and let people talk me out of it even though it sounded great. Then I went to law school because I'm, again, a loving moron. Do you have your JD? Have you passed a bar exam? If so, join the JAG corps. If not, don't enlist.
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Jun 21, 2012 23:34
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Nevvy Z posted:I'm a brilliant moron who should have gone into Navy nuclear poo poo in college but I got a scholarship and let people talk me out of it even though it sounded great. Then I went to law school because I'm, again, a loving moron. If you enlist with a degree, you are an idiot. Every waking moment will remind you that you made a mistake. Only in rare circumstances can I recommend enlisting with a degree. Leadership experience doesn't matter as an officer in the nuclear field. No one will consider respecting you until you're fully qualified anyway. Until then, you're just a Non-Useful Body. That being said, you may not have the college requirements to join as a nuke officer. Sorry. Talk to an officer recruiter. Don't talk to anyone that says you need to enlist first to {any reason} then get picked up for officer via {any program} because they're just trying to fill their quotas. Talk to a recruiter, find out if you're even eligible, then contact me on IRC if you're still interested. I'll do my best to talk you out of it because of how loving miserable it is then give you advice if you're still interested. vvvv - are you super in debt? KetTarma fucked around with this message at 23:50 on Jun 21, 2012 |
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Jun 21, 2012 23:36
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Henry Meowlins posted:Do you have your JD? Have you passed a bar exam? If so, join the JAG corps. If not, don't enlist. I have my JD. I am not currently planning to take the bar because I don't want to be a lawyer. I'm not asking about jag, because gently caress jag.
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Jun 21, 2012 23:37
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All nukes end up as sea lawyers anyway
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Jun 22, 2012 03:20
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Snowdens Secret posted:All nukes end up as sea lawyers anyway 
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Jun 22, 2012 03:26
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Oh. My. This plant in New York is rough. I didn't Prototype would be this bad.
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Jun 22, 2012 09:45
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itsrobbiej posted:Oh. My. This plant in New York is rough. I didn't Prototype would be this bad. Tell me stories. I'm going to be reporting to Prototype in South Carolina, but I'd imagine some things carry over.
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Jun 22, 2012 17:37
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KetTarma posted:If you enlist with a degree, you are an idiot. Every waking moment will remind you that you made a mistake. Only in rare circumstances can I recommend enlisting with a degree. Be very careful with officer recruiters. They like to poo poo bag as well.
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Jun 22, 2012 21:07
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Got to tour Surry Nuclear Power Plant today, which was pretty fuckin' awesome. I was actually rather surprised how small 800MW turbines and generators are; I expected everything would be way bigger. Even the containment building was smaller than I'd pictured it.
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Jun 22, 2012 22:54
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itsrobbiej posted:Oh. My. This plant in New York is rough. I didn't Prototype would be this bad. Oh, god. I'm reporting there at the beginning of August and classing up in October. Tell me you're at the S7G and also that I can go to the S8G and that it will be awesome and basically party central? Edit: oh goodness they replaced it with a S6W those monsters whyyyyyyyyy
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Jun 23, 2012 01:34
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Those TLAs might be TMI, just sayin'.
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Jun 23, 2012 04:11
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I'm at MARF....and the class is the biggest like...ever. It's so rough. You need X amount of points a day to be on the curve and this last week, we had 4 MM instructors on leave, and a command urinalysis, so no one was really around to give checkouts. I stayed on the curve, but barely. I guess MARF is over-crowded, but they are cool. Hands in pockets isn't a big deal. S8G is okay...seems like more people get checkouts, but with knocking on doors and regarding the senior rank every time you walk in there...I'm glad I'm MARF.
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Jun 24, 2012 02:42
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KetTarma posted:Surface officers act as a division officer on a non-nuke, then go through nuke school, do division officer on a carrier, then be a department head on a non-nuke, then department head on a nuke, then CO of a non-nuke, then Reactor Officer of a carrier, then go off to do something in Washington DC. What are typical shore assignments for sub officers? Do they typically stay within the submarine or larger nuclear community?
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Jun 24, 2012 06:43
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Ron Jeremy posted:What are typical shore assignments for sub officers? Do they typically stay within the submarine or larger nuclear community? There's a lot. DESRONs and CSGs almost always have sub guys on staff. They can do ROTCs and other schools. My XO at school was a sub guy. It just really depends on what they want to do. Once you get to a certain point, an URL (Unrestricted Line) officer is a URL officer. There's a lot of overlap once you start getting senior on the types of jobs that you do. There definitely are some specialized jobs, but there's a lot that it's just a body.
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Jun 24, 2012 06:54
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itsrobbiej posted:I'm at MARF....and the class is the biggest like...ever. It's so rough. You need X amount of points a day to be on the curve and this last week, we had 4 MM instructors on leave, and a command urinalysis, so no one was really around to give checkouts. I stayed on the curve, but barely. I guess MARF is over-crowded, but they are cool. Hands in pockets isn't a big deal. S8G is okay...seems like more people get checkouts, but with knocking on doors and regarding the senior rank every time you walk in there...I'm glad I'm MARF. Is D1G not there any more?
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Jun 26, 2012 17:12
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Oh, it's still there. I don't think they're ever going to get that giant ball of concrete down. It's just been decommissioned/retired in place.
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Jun 26, 2012 23:57
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Madurai posted:Is D1G not there any more? D1G prototype got decommed in '96
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Jun 27, 2012 02:05
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edit: I'm dumb.
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Jul 4, 2012 02:31
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belt posted:edit: I'm dumb. Blame the rotating shiftwork.
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Jul 4, 2012 15:03
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belt posted:edit: I'm dumb. Don't worry. We all are.
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Jul 4, 2012 19:23
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belt posted:edit: I'm dumb. I get to work on nuclear reactors? Where do I sign? The real dumb here? My signing bonus was 13 hundred dollars, after taxes. They were giving coners 13 thousand, by the time I was in welding school. 
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Jul 7, 2012 14:39
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I'm dumb as well.
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Jul 7, 2012 15:04
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Nevvy Z posted:I have my JD. I am not currently planning to take the bar because I don't want to be a lawyer. I'm not asking about jag, because gently caress jag. I'm in the same boat as well; I have a JD, I'm taking the CA bar because I just want to finish the last piece of my $100k education. I initially wanted to go to JAG but because of the current economy, which is poo poo for lawyers, the requirements for JAG admission are being in the top 20% of your class. Ironically, for my law school, magna cum laude just doesn't cut it for JAG. I've lived near various Navy bases both in the US and Japan and spent a good amount of time with SWOs and MPs.
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Jul 10, 2012 08:03
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MSNBC posted:Jansen Young survived the Colorado shooting thanks to the heroic act of her military boyfriend Jon Blunk, who sacrificed his own life by laying on top of her, shielding her from the bullets flying around the theater Story here Guy was a M-Div nuke on the Nimitz if anyone knew him. KetTarma fucked around with this message at 18:57 on Jul 21, 2012 |
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Jul 21, 2012 18:54
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There were a few questions asked back on the single-digit page numbers that weren't fully addressed that I want to answer here for anyone that might come looking for answers to the same questions. -You definitely CAN sign up for a different rate at MEPS and still take nuke while in DEP. I did that. When they proposed that to me, I called my recruiter and asked him if that was safe and told him I trusted him to not lie to me and possibly ruin a great career opportunity. I can't say that it always turns out this way but I got my new contract 3-4 months later. I ended up being in DEP for 14 months and I'm one of the only people I know that got 15k sign-on (others only got 12k). Also, I was a nuke-alpha (I didn't take any nuke test, I qualified from the ASVAB) and I'm not sure how that played into any of this. -If looking into the nuke field, you have never done drugs. You certainly can not continue doing drugs after getting in if that is something you are thinking about. Most people I know here have smoked marijuana but neglected to disclose it to the Navy and everybody knows that's how it is. Nobody cares as long as you understand you can't keep doing it. -If you are someone who didn't have to try at school and dropped out of college due to lack of interest or lack of effort then you will fit in. If you LARP, play Magic: The Gathering, spend excessive amounts of time on the internet, etc. you will also fit in just fine. I've been in the Navy for 11 months, been at NNPTC for 9 months, and I'm 10 weeks into Power school.
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Jul 26, 2012 00:22
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Yes, the LARPers fit in fine...its called RC div 
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Jul 26, 2012 00:24
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I've recently arrived at NNPTC, and because I haven't started classes yet, I have a ton of free time. Charleston is awesome, in case you were concerned about coming to SC.
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Jul 26, 2012 01:43
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