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anon_xdc8rmuek44eq
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for military academy athletes to play professionally before fulfilling their service obligation. Good idea IMO.
Do we really want the President of the United States involved in this sort of thing? Please.
I would favor it if waivers were available for other reasons as well, and maybe they already are. If a cadet wanted to go to med school, or law school, or get an MBA, etc., as long as the waiver time period was limited, say 10 years max, and the service obligation was fully met after graduation. If you get a waiver and then cannot serve (pro football injury, for example) you should have to pay back the entire cost of your academy education.
He is the Commander and Chief. No? Sounds like it could be a win-win if structured the right way.
Politicians pander to whatever group they are speaking too.
I believe a cadet can do those things within the confines of the military. In other words, a deserving cadet can go become a JAG. But, of course, they cannot play pro football for the military because they have no pro team.
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anon_xdc8rmuek44eq
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Well, I don't know who else would make this decision.... SecArmy? SecDef? Whether or not it's POTUS, I like the idea.
If so, then I definitely have no problem opening it to pro sports. It would only affect a small number of cadets each year and it might widen the recruiting reach of the academies.
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anon_xdc8rmuek44eq
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There are already a ton of opportunities and mechanisms for military folks to continue their professional education without any kind of waiver. For a 99% of these guys, a waiver won't mean anything, and it's more important for them to get experience in whatever their professional branch is (especially true for combat arms folks).
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anon_xdc8rmuek44eq
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I think he has to annually request an exemption to stay in the NFL; the waiver considered I think would allow for playing pro without having to request an exemption every year.
They already can if they are drafted or sign with a team.
from wikipedia
Keenan Reynolds (born December 13, 1994) is an American footballwide receiver for the Seattle Seahawks of the National Football League (NFL). He played college football for the Navy Midshipmen as a quarterback, where he finished his career with an NCAA Division I record 88 career touchdowns and an NCAA FBS record 4,559 rushing yards by a quarterback. Reynolds's rank in the U.S. Navy is lieutenant junior grade.
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anon_xdc8rmuek44eq
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Is that DoD policy or considered on a case by case basis? I believe it is case by case for the time being.
I think it's case by case...
I wouldn't be surprised if Noah Song, a stud pitcher on the baseball team, was given the same opportunity to sign with a pro team as well.
When I was in grad school at PSU a classmate of mine was active military, had just graduated from Air Force Academy, and the military sent him to PSU for a year to get a masters degree in Economics. His only military commitment was attending ROTC sessions once a week or so. Good guy, he had A LOT of fun in State College for the year he was there, then back to normal military life.
Current DoD policy is that military academy grads have to fulfill their service commitments before going to professional sports. At the time Reynolds was graduating, mid 2016, the DoD was in the midst of changing its policy to allow athletes to immediately go pro. That policy lasted a year, and was changed to the current policy in mid 2017.
All that being said, the DoD does attempt to reach accommodations for players with pro potential.
Exactly. Let's keep the commander and chief out of military decisions. ID. 10. T.
I think it's only fair that waivers are granted to athletes since they are also given for bone spurs.
Maybe you haven't been told. He's the Commander in Chief.
In extreme cases I agree. David Robinson grew too tall to serve in the Navy; it was a total waste having him out of the NBA answering phones for 2 years or whatever Annapolis decided.
Has to be case by case though (and already is, sort of).
Robinson was over the Academy's height limit when he first enrolled and required a waiver to do so.
because you can be an engineer inside the military. You cannot play professional football inside the military.
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anon_xdc8rmuek44eq
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The military already has its own med school and at least two services (I only know that the Army and USMC do or did) have small programs that pay for active duty officers to get either a JD or an LLM. I wouldn’t be surprised if they still have a program for master’s degrees at institutions other than their own DOD-run grad schools like the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey.
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The ACOE is, ironically, almost entirely civilian. In 2018 almost 98% of ACOE employees were civilians (~34000 to ~750 soldiers).
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anon_xdc8rmuek44eq
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Army JAG school is at UVA - I believe it
mandatory to attend (and get an LLM) if you stay in JAG and want to progress (past Major).
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anon_xdc8rmuek44eq
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Yes. I have tons of colleagues/friends who work for the ACOE including at the WH.
The best part of the Army Navy football rivalry is the two institutions and students are not like the rest of the D1 schools.
The students compete because of love of the sport not their first pro contract. Then they go on as our real gladiators and defenders of our country.
Let’s not ruin it. You want real D1 football, go to another college. Army and Navy are not just “another college”.
The students compete because of love of the sport not their first pro contract. Then they go on as our real gladiators and defenders of our country.
Let’s not ruin it. You want real D1 football, go to another college. Army and Navy are not just “another college”.
I’m sure there are. The Army program I mentioned pays for 25 soldiers a year to gi to law school. I imagine top of the class at USMA interested in JAG receives favorable consideration. There was a marine JAG guy working on an LLM in one of my law school classes, so I know USMC foots the bill for some law school, too. One of my closest friends from Penn State got an Army scholarship to med school and served (I believe) 6 years in the medical corps. He was even able to finagle 2 or 3 years of that at Carlisle Barracks.
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anon_xdc8rmuek44eq
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There is an application process for the program you’re talking about. Involves an applicant getting recommendations from JAG folks and then getting accepted to law school. Then it’s typically two years of service for every year of school paid for. In the Army, there were about a dozen of these folks a year. Has nothing to do with going to a service academy.
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/05/06/pen...s-call-to-reverse-student-athlete-policy.html
Pentagon shrugs off Trump's call to reverse student athlete policy at service academies
A shifting policy
The apparent disagreement Monday between the president and the Pentagon was only the latest chapter in the decades-long saga of whether to allow student athletes at service academies — where, like all students, their tuition is free — to defer their active-duty service to play pro sports.
For most of the 20th century, the policy was simple: Everyone served on active duty, regardless of their athletic prospects. But starting in the 1980′s the military began granting waivers to some star athletes to go pro right away. At the time, the military justified the waivers as a good public relations move for the service academies.
Waivers continued to be granted to star athletes during the next 30 years, but only in select cases, and only for two years. Then, as now, a lot depended on who was in charge in Washington.
In 2016, the Obama administration expanded the waivers to include up to five years of deferment, not just two. As part of the expansion, then-Secretary of Defense Ash Carter announced at the Naval Academy graduation ceremony in May that recently drafted quarterback Keenan Reynolds would be allowed to defer his active-duty service to play for the Baltimore Ravens.
“Keenan . . . you are cleared and approved to defer your service so you can pursue your NFL dreams. Go get ’em,” Carter said to Reynolds, prompting the audience to burst into cheers.
Fast forward one year to the spring of 2017, just days before the National Football League’s annual draft.
At the Air Force Academy in Colorado, two football players who expected to be drafted and granted waivers to play in the NFL were stunned to learn their waivers had been denied. At the time they got the news, there had been no formal announcement of a policy switch.
But on April 29, the final day of the 2017 draft, then-Secretary of Defense James Mattis signed a memo requiring that all service academy graduates serve a minimum of two years active duty upon graduation. With a stroke of his pen, Mattis had effectively ended three decades of selective waivers granted to star athletes.
It was unclear late Monday what the next steps might be for the Pentagon’s current policy.
There’s always an application process for formal educational goodies. “Top of the class” was more important to my post than the “USMA” part; I was responding to a post describing the experience of a West Pointer sent to med school. The statute authorizing FLEP and the Army’s FLEP regs give TJAG the discretion to send 25 soldiers to law school every year. The Army says they sent 25 in FY12.
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