Where will I end up?
 

Im in AECF and im worried that if I end up ET that they may just throw me in an office somewhere fixing copy machines or something dumb like that. I really want to be out to the fleet. Whats the chance I will get stuck shoreside? Or do I have a say? I would imagine there would be enough volunteers of people who want to stay on land.

Well... look at it this way. You may end up fixing copy machines on a carrier ^.^

Dont feel bad, I have a friend that is an ET, when he first started he ended up getting coffee for the marines in Iraq! Now he fixes office equipment on a carrier on Admiral Staff..yes, he hates it! And he has been in 20 years this June!

well I already have intentions on re-enlisting, probably making a 20 year career out of it. But if that happens to me il be out the second my contract is up.

The Navy sends you where they need you, be it shore duty or a carrier. Generally, your first tour will be sea duty then shore duty, but not always. If you really want to have the best chance at a say in it, you need to do well in your A and C schools. The highest GPA usually picks their orders then next highest and so on; if you're in the middle (and definitely in the rear) you probably won't get too much say in orders. One way or another though, you're an ET, you'll be fixing and doing preventative maintenance on electronics like copy machines, somewhere.

That's not true at all for ET's. Orders are given out needs of the Navy. You'll get a dream sheet to put location, ship type, school, etc. I've seen the people with the lowest GPA's get IFF school which is the hardest ET C school. And the smartest ones get crap C schools. It all depends on the detailer. I was lucky the detailer we had gave everyone location they wanted.

Most likely you'll go to a ship but there are plenty of chances of pulling shore duty out of A school. I had an entire class that graduated a few weeks before me all get shore duty to Guam. Special CNO orders that had to be filled asap. You have no say in orders other than filling out a dream sheet and hoping you may get what you want.

Though you really need to get rid of that "I don't want to fix copy machines etc" because you'll end up working on a lot of equipment you don't want to fix and that kind of attitude won't bode well with senior ETs and especially Chiefs.

My friend that is an ET, his first duty was in Iraq, was "suppose" to be putting in all the electronic communications, but ended up mostly getting coffee for the Marines stationed at that post and fixing all the stuff they broke. He was also an instructor for "C" school for another duty, a recruiter for another, a ship earlier, and in his final tour is with Admiral Staff fixing their office stuff on a carrier in VA. You may get a "dream sheet", but sometimes you make the choices by the location(where in this world do you want to be) not the job/ship/shore.

If your smart you'd tell your instructors that your family works on "ground terminals" and you'd like to get into that area too. Ground terminals are the 85 foot dishes that collect the satellite payloads. You can't put those dishes on ships (well there is 2 you can). Thus you will get a shore billet.

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You want this NEC

Dont worry ETs arent THAT bad. Me being a FC or course im a little bias, but ETs still have some cool things you can do. I have a friend that got accepted into Devgroup( i think that was the name) and he basically works with the Seals. He had to go to dive school and do all the things pre buds do. You can still go IA. ETs do have a higher probablity of getting shore duty but whether you get ET or FC im sure youll be happy.