Educational Experience in the Military

For those who can't afford college of do not feel they are ready for college after high school yet want to continue in some sort of continuing education then serving in our armed forces might be what they are looking for. I spent nine year active duty in the Navy and received what would be an equivalent of an associates degree in my basic school for my job, or rating as it is known in the Navy. After basic training I spent 15 weeks in Ingleside, TX, just across the bay from Corpus Christi, learning all about the history, current uses, deployment, and testing procedures of under water mines as well as the shipboard aspect of the job. It was 15 weeks of eight hours a day in the class room and labs. I also at other periods in my career had advanced classes in certain under water mine systems, firefighting training, Hazardous Materials handler and coordinator training, and I was instructed in the basic maintenance and operation of the Precise Integrated Navigational System that was used on the Mine Sweepers. For real world experience and training this was a great opportunity, but unfortunately for my case not much of this counted for college credits because of the nature of the information I learned was classified secret. For other ratings in the Navy this is not so much of a problem. A lot of people come out of the military with several college credits hours from their military education. I had all this opportunity for education in the military and I did even get into what the military will help you out on when it come to going to college. I'll save that for my next post.