Any tips for direct convert 38B to MC2 getting from SELRES to active duty?

PO2 (Join to see) Good, I hope you get in and maybe see you in the Fleet one day.

Yes, if you go to the Navy e-learning site, go to the course selection page. I forget exactly how to get there, but you need to find the Navy War College page and go to the Professional Military Education section. The one you want to start out is Introductory (the E1 to E4 one). Start there and you can go further, they'll help you out too since they count for education courses.

Another good tool to use is NavyBMR. They have a website and an app, and they're very good to learn and study everything. The app has stuff for your job and BMR. A Bluejacket Manual is good to have, as well as books about the Navy Petty Officer, since it has some good tips and information.

Hope this helps.

Without knowing if you have prior active service in the Army before any reserve time i will say this 7 years as a reservist takes like 28 years of reserve time, as how they calculate you total active duty time is through accumulated retirement points which amounts to a 4:1 ratio.

I also would like to know why you did not just enlist directly to Active duty?

I would like to offer some insight into navy etiquette, only i can't you are a black shoe, and the brown shoe navy (aviation), is different. We are even more laid back in aviation.

These term comes from the color of the shoe worn by officers and chiefs in the Navy. The standard black dress shoe you were issued in the army is worn by all non aviation personnel. The Aviation people wear a brown shoe that has a leather sole, for traction on the flight deck (the rubber melts to the deck).

Read the blue jackets manual, and do your BMR's (basic military requirements) also you will want to do the 3 and 2 manual for your rate (MC), and also the 1 and C. If you have an active duty navy post near you, try and see if their are any NEETS ( Navy Electronics Education Training) modules for your rate, if their aren't then do any NEETS modules for ET, AT, ST or any other rate you think will be close to what you do.

These count as corespondents courses and will give you retirement points, check to make sure you do not exceed 90 points in a given year or they are lost. However, they should help you with taking the rating exam (you will have to complete the 1 and c manual before you will be eligible for the first class exam), and will give you bullet points on your Evaluation (like NCOER) (all navy personnel even e-1's get an eval).

The army has kind of fucked you over too, challenge coins were used by the army to replace letters of commendation; and in the navy letters of commendation are worth promotion points, because they navy doesn't give awards to enlisted men (it does happen but it way more rare than the army); I remember i had a first line supervisor who had been awarded the Navy achievement medal, and that was the only award he had as an E-6. Contrast that to seeing E-3's and 4's in the army with arcoms. Get all your awards you can transferred over, including any badges as those may be worth promotion points too. if you were lucky and got some personnel awards form your unit(s) you will have leg up on most people at your pay grade.

I am not sure how the reserves work Surface warfare qualifications, but you need to get that as soon as you can too.

SPC Chris Ison Thanks for the study tips here. To answer your questions a bit: (1) I have 2 years of active duty time from Army deployments. My retirement points calculator boiled down to 7 years of service if I read the paperwork correctly. (2) Looking back, I wish I had gone active Army out of the gate, but I ended up with a recruiter really pushing Civil Affairs, and my idiot 20-year-old self did not realize I was not going to be on active duty right out of AIT.

(3) I tried looking into prior-service active duty opportunities, but the Navy and Air Force only take OSVET prior service from RC to AC. The Army options for coming back in active were pretty slim and the Army recruiter was not giving me much to work with.

I do plan to get every possible award and badge transferred over. I will for sure check into those modules. I'm trying to build a solid combined study plan for all of the Navy boot basics plus my rating and then venture into Petty Officer indoc.

Again, thanks for the input.

It happens, even to older people. I had a guy who i went through boot camp with who was like 32 or something, and had worked on oil derricks as an engineer, had a masters degree, and was an E-1 while in A-school; he found out he was a TAR (AGR type), active duty reservist, which is not what he wanted when he enlisted. He was lucky he was able to apply for OCS based on his civilian education, and he was placed on full AD as staff officer of some sort.

That leads me to another thing, as an E-5 ( i think it has changed to an E-6 promotional now); the navy has two programs the CWO and the LDO. If you are going to stay reserves i urge you to get a commission, the reserves only pay out (with 2 years active duty) about 19% of base pay at 55 years ( 21% at 62). You do not get paid retirement as a reservist until age 55.

How to calculate your retirement is easy take the total number of points you have, and divide buy 360; this gives the total number of years of time, rite now yo say 7, that seems a bit high, but again i do not know who old you are, by 2.5%; so 7 years is about 17.5%.

It works out for active duty the same way, you get 1 point for every days of active duty, so 365 * 20 / 360 = ~ 20; 20 * 2.5 = 50%.

If it has not changed (and it is possible it has) the maximum points in a retirement year is 90. so it is a 4:1 ratio. if you join at 18, do 40 years that is age 58, 4:1 is 10 years, or 25%; maybe as high as 28% depending on how long the A school or AIT is, and of course 2.5% for each year of an active duty deployment.

Officer get paid Absalom double what an enlisted man gets paid, so if you can secure a commission, that 30% will be Equivalent to a 20 yr ad pension as an enlisted sailor.