what happens once i receive direct commission to army reserve

In this post, I discuss my kickoff week at the Regular army's Direct Commission Class, or DCC.

For more than detailed information, please encounter my book The DCC Survival Guide: Succeeding at the Army's Direct Committee Course and its companion work The JAG School Survival Guide: Succeeding at the Army's Guess Advocate Officer Basic Course.

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I just completed my first week of the Ground forces's Straight Commission Course, or DCC. This course teaches bones soldiering skills to officers who have received a directly commission. (These officers received their commission without completing the traditional commissioning routes through Due west Point, ROTC, or OCS.)

The Army typically reserves directly commissions for professionals. These officers serve very particular functions within the Army. And then, typical recipients of direct commissions are doctors, chaplains, and—as in my case—lawyers.

(Occasionally, however, other officers may receive straight commissions. This, however, is relatively rare and mostly reserved for experienced enlisted personnel, often in the Reserves.)

This means that everyone in this class showed upwardly as a commissioned officer. The purpose of DCC, therefore, is not to provide a ways to earn a commission. Everyone is already a commissioned officer. Instead, DCC serves to train deputed officers on how to deed accordingly in the United States Regular army.

Construction of DCC

NCOs primarily atomic number 82 DCC. (There are, yet, a few captains that provide instruction from fourth dimension to time.) This is not unusual. NCOs have traditionally served as instructors in officer candidate courses in every co-operative simply the Air Force. DCC, nevertheless, is unique because the students are non officer candidates—they are already officers. This means that the students outrank the teachers.

This creates an interesting atmosphere. The stereotypical military machine environment characterized by loud yelling is mostly non nowadays. The enlisted leadership still provides instruction and corrects our mistakes. It nevertheless creates a unique situation where the words "sir" or "ma'am" follow a reprimand.

The NCOs running our class are exceptional. I think my class is lucky to take received the leadership it did. They all seem to take their responsibleness seriously. I, therefore, believe the unabridged experience will exist much better as a effect.

An interesting attribute of the class is the presence of those with prior commissioned service. It is my agreement that the Army recently decided to require all new entrants to the JAG Corps to attend DCC. This includes those who were not directly committee officers.

So, we have several ROTC and OCS graduates in our grade. Also, while our class doesn't, previous classes have had Westward Point graduates as well. Consequently, we have some captains in our class and prior classes have fifty-fifty had majors.

Since the purpose of the class is to teach bones soldiering skills, I don't know why the Army requires these individuals to attend. DCC provides instruction on rudimentary skills. Perhaps their presence is more to aid the direct committee officers during the course.

DCC at Fort Benning

Fort Benning is a massive Ground forces post. Growing up on Air Forcefulness bases—my father was career Air Force—I take minimal familiarity with Army facilities. (I am in the Arkansas National Baby-sit. So, I am familiar only with Camp Robinson and Fort Chaffee. Neither has served as an active duty post for some time.)

Fort Benning houses an extraordinarily large number of Regular army units and schools. The Army's Armor Schoolhouse, Infantry School, Airborne Schoolhouse, OCS, the NCO Academy, and bones training all live hither. In addition, elements of the 75 ^th Ranger Regiment take a presence here too.

As you tin see above, our rooms are pretty dainty for an initial training program. They are much nicer than I expected. There are two of united states of america to a room with each room having its own bathroom. So, this is not exactly bones training.

Week 1 of the Direct Committee Course

This calendar week was devoted to in-processing. We waited in a lot of lines and completed a lot of paperwork. There was some classroom time where the cadre provided teaching on various topics of Ground forces life and tradition. We besides had some time to larn drill and ceremony, which substantially means marching.

I suppose the most memorable role of this calendar week was the physical training. The Army has a unique concrete training programme that consists of a lot of foreign exercises. Information technology does, however, help break upwardly the running.

Nosotros besides conducted our 1-one-ane evaluation, which is essentially a one-half-PFT. (The Army physical fitness test consists of two minutes of pushups, two minutes of sit-ups, and a 2-mile run. So, the 1-1-1 required one minute of pushups, one infinitesimal of sit-ups, and a ane-mile run.) This evaluation is mostly to evidence where we need to improve.

Overall, information technology was a pretty slow calendar week. We are off for the 3-mean solar day weekend. So, unless we have CQ—or charge of quarters—we are pretty much on our ain during this time. Our billet are correct across from that of OCS'due south, and I doubt they savour the same privilege. Nosotros oasis't had much interaction with them, so I don't know if they find that aggravating.

Of course, the Army is near to thrust a much more meaning responsibility upon them. As lawyers, we will not be leading whatever troops into boxing. They very well could. I suppose the hereafter level of responsibility determines the intensity of training.

Since we accept already been trained to be lawyers, we have already received significant training for our profession. This is not the example for the infantry officer, who may have to pb men into extremely challenging situations. A civilian education could not fix him for that.

Adjacent Week

Next week we are learning land navigation. I'1000 looking forrad to that week. Information technology should be fun, and the week should movement a lot faster than this one. I will proceed to blog as I have the opportunity. Please check dorsum regularly if you lot're interested in learning more well-nigh the program.

I provide a more expansive account of my experience in my bookThe DCC Survival Guide: Succeeding at the Army's Direct Commission Course and its companion piece of work The JAG School Survival Guide: Succeeding at the Army's Judge Abet Officer Basic Form.

The views and opinions expressed in this post are the writer'south own and exercise not reverberate the official policy or position of the United States Ground forces, the National Baby-sit Bureau, the Arkansas National Guard, the Department of Defense, or the United states of america Government.

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See Likewise:

Ground forces JAG Grooming

Week 2 of the Army'southward Direct Commission Course (DCC)

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Source: https://www.garrettham.com/army-dcc-1/