I am a junior in high school (17) and I am considering the US Air Force. I am the top junior in my class, have a 4.2 GPA and I’m straight A student. I know that joining the Air Force might sound dumb, given that I am really smart; but, I am a fitness fanatic. I want to join because I want to be physically and mentally fit (especially physically… I love fitness, even though I’m kind of skinny). Becoming a general or perhaps an engineer in the Air Force sounds kind of interesting to me.
So before I do anything, I want to know if you can get deployed EVEN if you are an only child. You see, my mom doesn’t like the idea of me fighting because she doesn’t want to lose me. I don’t mind fighting for the US even though i wasn’t born here (I am from Honduras, a Central American country. I only have a Green Card at the moment but will become a citizen by the time I’m 21 or 22). I am really confused and troubled. Is the ROTC right for me? Should I go to an Ivy League School with a minority scholarship or something? I don’t know what to do. Heck.. I don’t even know what I want to study yet… the only reason why I talked about engineering is because it is a field of study in the Air Force (and it has fitness to go with it). I know what you might be thinking: “He should study fitness or something related to that since he likes it so much”. I don’t feel that it’s a great major because it is kind of vague and shallow (at least to me)… Other interests of mine are math (love it), business, and media/game design. Maybe this can help you answer my troubling questions.
I apologize for the lengthy paragraph… I just wanted to be as detailed as possible.
Any help is appreciated
air force isnt the best place for fitness… but you’ll get outa it what you put into it. GL becoming a general, you’re thinking like 30 years and 1% down the road.
air force doesnt do fighting over in iraq and afghan…they’re caled air force for a reason. they have a few spec ops personel that do missions, but thats it. 99% of air force jobs are technical/computer ones.
yes u can get deployed as an only child…that doesnt mean anything these days.
what does engineering have to do with fitness? dont have to be very fit to design a building or wahtever.
You can get deployed and if in five years we are in both Iraq and Afganistan you prob will get deployed. The good news is you will just be sitting on your butt chillin while the Army or Marines do the real work.
Fitness is not as stressed as you would think, but anytime you are an officer you will have to be in better shape then almost everyone else.
engineering is a wonderful and fulfilling field. i’m an engineer and i love it. but you have to find what you love. that’s why you take those 100 level courses in college to dip into different fields and find out what you really like to do. so first and foremost, find out what you love to do and study that.
as far as the air force, do you have the possibility of attending the academy? you might have to be a citizen, so i’m not sure if that’s possible for you. can you just go take the citizenship test? i have no clue how that works, so i apologize for sounding ignorant. but that would obviously be the best way to becoming an officer in the air force. ROTC is also a great path, but the might have the same citizenship requirements that USAFA has. if you have the chance at joining the academy or attending an ivy league school, i would take it. look at it this way. the air force is a job. it might turn out to be the best thing you’ve ever done, but you might also find out you dislike it. if you have an ivy league degree behind you, then you have a huge amount of options.
don’t join the air force because you love fitness. that’s not a very good reason to join the military and put your life on the line. go running or join a gym, that’ll keep you fit. join the military because you love this country and want to dedicate yourself to protecting it.
and to answer your original question, yes you can get deployed if you’re an only child.
In order to qualify for ROTC programs you do have to be a US Citizen, Green Card holders cannot be Officers in the US Military.
Yes you can be deployed to anywhere at anytime whether you are an only child or 1 of 20 children. You are volunteering to join the military you are not being forced to join or drafted.
I have no clue what Alexander M is talking about but the Air Force deploys regularly. That is even why they extended boot camp from 6 weeks to 8 1/2. Air missions are only 1% of their over all job. I have a few friends in the Air Force who have deployed. In fact at the base here we just had a security forces squadron deploy to Iraq. I know a few others who were hydraulics mechanics and C-130 maintainers who just deployed. Not to mention Aerial Gunners who man C-130 gunships and Pave Low helicopters. The Air Force does more than people think. And yes you can be deployed as an only child.