August 2011 Board

[GreenLantern330]

You people are going to be neurotic in flight school.

I'm not sure how many times I've posted it, but only worry about the things you can control. Someone else's application is not something you can control. Everyone here knows where their weak points are. You've got a minimum of 6 months to fix those deficiencies if you don't get selected (and outside of an ASTB retake, I'm not sure how many major changes you can make in under 6 months). Worrying about how you stack up is just wasted energy and stress you don't need. Put forth your best application and drive on.

I agree 110% on the underlined. As for the bold, no disrespect intended but... I didn't think you had started flight school or finished OCS yet.

 

[fattestfoot]

I haven't. But I've seen enough posts here worrying about NSS cutoffs and all sorts of other stuff that doesn't really matter. If you're in flight school and NSS is the only thing keeping your performance up, you've probably already failed. Pretty sure you don't have to have been winged to recognize this behavior.

I don't mean this as an insult to anyone (because I understand wanting to be as informed as possible), but just recognize that someone having a 70 9/9/9 isn't going to change what your application already looks like.

 

[GreenLantern330]

Concur 100%.

 

[cmcalvert]

The best way I've found to keep my mind off the board is by trying to set personal bests in the "12 ounce curl". Good news: I'll be at the lake for three days this holiday weekend. Bad news: so will my wife's family. I love my wife's family, but I feel like I'm setting a bad example for her little cousins when I fall off the dock at 4:00 in the afternoon b/c I've had too much to drink.

 

[AllAmerican75]

I don't have anything better to do. Be afraid. . .be very afraid.

Dammit, man! You're not helping at all! Now I'm going to spend the rest of the night freaking out.

I'm totally freaking out, man.

 

[Christopher Allen]

I have ups and downs just like everyone else. ASTB and GPA were my strong points, but I went into the boards nervous at people that got mediocre ASTB scores but were sports captains, presidents of fraternities, had congressional LORs, etc. Me personally, I had a good Civil Air Patrol track record, black belt, participate in Honor Guard, just to name a few. My point with whole person concept: yes, my ASTB scores are great, but I know that there are many people that far exceed me in other standards and are better than me overall. I try my best to bring my other areas up but I'm nowhere near perfect.
YOU can have a better package than me without my ASTB scores, I promise. If you volunteer, seek out great LORs, get active at your college, play a sport, do well at your job, fly some if you want to be a pilot, study diligently in school, take hours or even days to write a killer motivational statement, get that professionally edited (one grammar mistake on that goes a long way), have a great PT routine, and many other things, you can get selected with a 6/6/6/47 or whatever. It is no secret how to get a pro-rec. Do all I said above and I guarantee you'll get a pro-rec. I hope this helps and you take it to heart. I spoke to many people on this board who wouldn't do X or Y because it was "too much work..." they do not get a pro-rec, they do not try 200%, and they don't want this as badly as everyone else that goes the extra 10 miles to make their package just a tiny bit better. Like I said, I did it, I got what I wanted from this forum, now I'm here to try and help yall.

Thanks, that's what I was looking for.

 

[eas7888]

Thanks, that's what I was looking for.

I can sum it up even better. This Ensign's 'Keys to Success': Do your best, help your community out, and don't be a douche.

 

[Sonog]

Probably too late for this now for a lot of people, but the best way that I've found to deal with the anxiety and waiting of selection board results is just to keep busy and live your life as if you were never even applying. First of all since there is no guarantee that anyone will get in even with 9/9/9 80, 4.o gpa, jerked off a senator, whatever. You should plan your life accordingly for not getting selected. I want this more than anything else, but I'm barely thinking about it now because my day is filled doing things to prepare for my civilian career that may or may not be necessary. My first military selection board all I did was check message boards all day and play with numbers and selection statistics, and it sucked. Sucked even more when I didn't get selected, and sucked to realize that I was putting all of my eggs into one basket both emotionally and mentally. Don't be afraid to take a job or start school again, because if you do get selected, dropping any commitments, financial, time, or work, will be totally secondary to following your dream.

 

[twobecrazy]

don't be a douche.

+1

 

[miguel]

IDC Board results are out. I received a PRO-REC for INTEL. Talk to your OR's and for fleet applicants check BOL (selection board/advancement section). Good luck to all.

 

[PRISSY83]

CONGRATS TO YOU MIGUEL!

I received a PRO-REC for IW (INFORMATION WARFARE).
I am a fleet applicant.

GOOD LUCK TO EVERYONE!!!

 

[Christopher Allen]

THIS. Exactly.

@egd33: As I told another poster who asked me the same question via PM, all the grades, scores, LORs, etc. All that is superficial bullshit. When i'm in the plane during training (or in the fleet in another year) and something goes wrong, do you think my instructor would love me and think I'm an awesome student if I went "Sir/Ma'am, well I don't exactly remember the boldfaced EP that I'm supposed to have memorized but I went to Stanford (hypothetical) and had a 3.9 gpa and I know a 1-star. Oh and I have 1000+ hours of flight time......."

Do that and see what happens. The bottomline is this, for those of you that think that all that crap is the WHOLE PERSON, its not. its exactly what sdpilot6 just described. It's the board members going "Would I want this person serving in my command and would I feel comfortable having them lead my sailors or possibly have my life in their hands one day.....could they meet that challenge?" I can assure that is probably one of MANY questions they pose when they are making the decision. What you have on paper doesn't mean crap compared to how you come across. Yeah I didn't have any of that stuff either and I made it and the other guy didn't. Why? No he didn't have a police record and I dont know about his motivational statement either. But I didn't have a police record either, but I know I had multiple examples of experience and I talked about that in my statement (when the statement was limited to like 400 words or something). I made sure that my statement and my application, to me, came across as "here is why I would make an outstanding naval officer and the guy in front of me and behind me won't."

Now I didn't actually say that, but I had been in this situation before where I had to let other stuff shine for me. I knew my undergrad gpa wasn't that hot, so I submitted a statement explaining why it was that way. I was able to back that up w/ my graduate GPA. That's one minor example. The guy from my example, that was all he had was scores. Thats it. He had no real activities outside of school.....nothing. He did nothing w/ that flight time he had, so who was it benefiting? No one.

So thats why I say, all that stuff is superficial top-surface stuff. The "whole person" digs deeper than that. And the board knows exactly what they're doing because they do it often.

@Christopher Allen: You're kind of in a safe zone by posting that here, but had you been disrespectful like that in another thread on here, you would've gotten your ass lit up. Don't forget, this may be a forum, but the same people you smart mouth, are guys (MB, myself, eas7888) who are already in the shoes that you're trying to fill. The same respect you'd give in person, is the same you give on here.

I apologize for the disrespectful comment, I'm new to this and didn't realize the difference between a member and contributor.

 

[MasterBates]

Here is a hint,

If you see wings on the profile, we really have winged.

Sent from my PC36100 using Tapatalk

 

[ChiefM]

Good job, Miguel. What were your stats, by the way?

 

[CUPike11]

The best way I've found to keep my mind off the board is by trying to set personal bests in the "12 ounce curl". Good news: I'll be at the lake for three days this holiday weekend. Bad news: so will my wife's family. I love my wife's family, but I feel like I'm setting a bad example for her little cousins when I fall off the dock at 4:00 in the afternoon b/c I've had too much to drink.

All of you need to take some time and be more like this guy. Awesome. You'll fit in just fine here.