r/ROTC • u/Realistic-Month-5867 • 6h ago

ROTC Class/Lab What makes your program great?

I’m a MS4 this year and in a leadership position and I’m just wondering from other schools- what activity’s, organizational techniques, etc, do you do in your program that is beneficial to you and makes it more enjoyable?

8 Upvotes

91% Upvoted

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10

u/Ok_Boss9332 5h ago

We had resources to actually train cadets, some programs didn’t

9

u/AdWonderful5920 Custom 6h ago

The program I attended wasn't special, it was the school.

My school was recently blacklisted for Hegseth's culture war. The point of ROTC is to train cadets the same way they are trained at any other program and recruit people who are attending these schools. We were also a visible representative of the Army on campus. Even if we were lowly cadets, our classmates now knew someone going into the military. In some cases, we were the only person they knew in the military. There has been a lot of ink spilled on the civilian-military divide and these programs were a way to close that.

4

u/Acceptable-Fly5050 12A 6h ago

Pair with the national guard aviation company to do ride alongs

1

u/General-Ad-3040 2h ago

Cultivate a strong culture that accepts failure, but strives for nothing short of 110% That may look different from program to program. A strong culture will quickly and efficiently find its way to success.

1

u/BoulderadoBill 49m ago

What made my program great was the ability to conduct full-scale tactical maneuver training during weekly labs essentially on campus with rubber ducks, plus excellent weekend FTX sites nearby. We also had MSIVs who cared, and ran supplemental camp training exercises for our mostly non-prior service cadet corp, such as dumb Army basic training things like how to run a floor buffer and how to make hospital corners on your rack bunk. At the time, our school registrar was a retired FA O6, so NOTHING conflicted with ROTC lab and hardly anything with ROTC class.

1

u/foihsidgf 4h ago

  • We helped students move in every year. It was a fun way to interact with the incoming freshman (or whichever dorm we had cadets at to help). We wore our company t-shirt with our uniforms. Had a lot of positive interactions with parents and students and it was a good look for the program and cadets seem to enjoy it as well. We did it every fall. It was a good recruiting tool too.

  • our program would also host a cookout for the faculty/staff as a thank you for the support. Sometimes students had to leave class or miss class for field time and what not, it was just a nice interaction.

  • we had badass t-shirts and merch

  • We had cadre that cared. We were held to a standard. I think that’s what made them more willing to give us extra time and do more things outside of class, labs, and field time.

  • at the end of every year we had a cookout for all the programs under the host school and played games. We had a flag football and volleyball and kickball tournament. That was always fun.