I've always thought NUPOC was one of the better programs the Navy has -- students join around their junior year of college, get a $15,000 "selection bonus" and $2,990 to $5,000 a month for up to 30 months (up from $1,000 back in the '80s), and go to OCS after they graduate. I didn't find any recent numbers, but I know that about 10 years ago about 30% of nuclear officers came in via the NUPOC route. I really don't know of a program that pays better for going to college -- plus you have a really good job waiting for you when you graduate.
So what do you think is the best deal -- NECP/STA-21, Naval Academy, NROTC, or NUPOC? And which program provides the best officers? (Being somewhat prejudiced, I vote STA-21/NECP.)
Totally Unrelated Plea For Votes: Remember to vote for The Stupid Shall Be Punished for "Best Up And Coming Blog" in the 2008 Weblog Awards. Click here to vote until 2200Z Tuesday. You can vote every 24 hours from every computer to which you have access. As of Sunday night, I have about a 400 vote lead, so let's keep the momentum going. Thanks again for all your support!
Update 2114 12 Jan: An E-mail from the National Director of the NUPOC program provided some good numbers on accession percentage, and offered some interesting insights. Excerpts:
"...I will say confidently that NUPOC is the best deal available for any officer program in all of DOD, not just the nuclear Navy (with possible exception of some of the medical programs). In all honesty, one of the problems we have when we present the program at schools is that students think it's "too good to be true" and there must be some catch. Of course, the majority of college students are either ineligible or will not even consider military service, but for those who fit the profile it's the best deal out there.
"To answer a question from your post, we get about 1/3 of our sub and surface nuke officers from USNA, about 1/3 from NROTC, and 1/3 from NUPOC. NROTC and NUPOC also provide staff engineers to work at NR, and NUPOC provides all officers for the NPS instructor program.
"Most of our awareness comes from student presentations, career fairs, local advertising, and word of mouth, but we are launching a new initiative that my interest you and your fellow bloggers: A naval nuclear propulsion micro website and facebook fan page. The site will be up at the end of February..."
I'll be really interested to check out those new web sites when they come on line.
