The Officer Critical Skills Retention Bonus
SWJ blog post - The Officer Critical Skills Retention Bonus
Quote:
I received the following memo by Colonel J. B. Burton (USA), Commanding Officer of
Dagger Brigade Combat Team in Iraq, via "
Warlord Loop" e-mail. An abbreviated version appeared in the Washington Post - see
Tom Rick’s Inbox dated 8 July 2007. COL Burton has been kind enough to permit the SWJ to post it in full. Where a military acronym is used I have inserted an explanation...
Read the memo at the first link above...
Link to previous thread...
Army Offers Officers Incentives - original e-mail now w/ permission to post from COL Burton...
1 Attachment(s)
Better adopt some of those recommendations or...
the only requirements will be opposable thumbs:D
Free tuition for military families?
We talk about a holistic look and targeted rewards. We also have identified the growing influence of spouses and children on retention of those leaders with skills marketable on the outside.
Instead of just mandating the time owed for every year of grad school, how about giving credit up front(I'm not talking about the GI Bill)? How about extending that to families?
The first is like COL Burton describes - For every two years you servepast the initial 4, you get a year off to attend grad school at a state school.
The second applies to your family. For every 4 years past the initial 4, one of your kids gets their tuition paid for at a state school.
My point- make it attractive for the family in a long term way. You make it an incentive for more then just retention, it also becomes an incentive for attracting talent you might otherwise miss out on. It goes back to the public by introducing educated young Americans with a family background of service.
Nearly free tuition for military families
The term around these parts is remission.
If you are the spouse or child of a faculty member you get 2/3rds off your tuition state run institution undergraduate (only) program. There can be caveats like (must get a (insert level of achievement) grade or higher).
As long as a person is employed full time by the united states military their spouses/children should get at least remission of fees in addition to normal scholarships/awards.
I know there is always a money issue, but regardless of incentives to keep people in the military it is the RIGHT thing to do. Unfortunately the money issue is looked at first and not the RIGHT thing to do. With the federal government pulling funding from higher education, states pulling funding from higher education, grants and awards dwindling, and some state schools considering privatizing this is an idea that won't likely make it out of the barn.