Originally Posted by rickair7777
You sound like a pretty sharp guy...once you get into the fleet check out the seaman-to-admiral program. You need some college credits I believe, but if you are accepted you can go directly to OCS, flight school, the RAG, then an operational squadron tour. After your squadron tour, the Navy sends you to a civilian college to finish your degree with full active duty pay and benies at the O-3 level. Hard to beat. Also apply to Annapolis; there are slots reserved for qualified enlisted that are often not used...all you have to do is meet the minimums usually, you don't have to compete with the congressional appointment pool.
Warning: Navy/Marine Air has a lot of helos...fun to fly, but it is difficult to salvage an airline career after 10 years as a helo pilot. It can be done, but might involve starting over in the fixed-wing world.
The Air National Guard has two major advantages:
1) You can sign up for fixed-wing, no risk of getting stuck in rotors.
2) You can build 121 experience at a regional airline while doing the guard.
Ya man! STA-21 for sure. Although you have it somewhat mixed around. If you get selected for STA you will first start out at NSI in Newport, RI then you head to an ROTC unit, although you must both get selected for STA as well as gain admission to the college you plan to go to, and you will have 36 months to complete a BA/BS degree. You must first get the degree approved by a detailer (they can figure out if you can finish in the appropriate time) once you do that, your off to OCS, commissioned, and then head to training for whatever area you were selected for. One thing about STA is that when you submit your package, you will be applying for a certain field, whether it be NA, NFO, nuke, intel, etc, etc. So if selected you will have it written in your contract which field you will be going to. Pretty cool IMO. BTW, I'll be applying for that every year, but I'm not going to ruin myself if I don't make it, I'll just have to suck it up at the regionals for awhile.