Advice Please!

SpecOps87 SG

Hi all,

Going to be enlisting this year,I'm gonna be enlisting this year (woohoo!) but I'm wondering what are the prospects of a Diploma holder in the SAF in terms of career development and all that (though many tell me time and again that SAF is not career development unless you're a scholar) though I've heard of Dip. holders being majors below age 30. How true is that? Is it all "heng/suay", "strictly academic based" or "performance based" . Personally I'm considering a short-term career with the SAF, before going off to study and hopefully work in the defense industry doing marketing or international business development.

Hope the lao-jiaos here can share some words of wisdom.

Thanks,

SpecOps87

dkcx SG

You have not even enlist, haven't even got to OCS already thinking of becoming officier? Thats still a long way more i would say.

Your promotions with a diploma will be slower than those with degrees but you should still be able to promote as long as u work well but dun expect a major that early. My 2 former OCs both got their MAJ at 31 but both degree holders. I doubt diploma can get you MAJ rank that early unless you really that outstanding.

SpecOps87 SG

Yah I know...but I just wish to go in with an open mind and understand the system.

dkcx SG

After you enter you might not even want sign on after you seen the truths inside that we have seen :p

kentheman SG

i believe those who got their major below the age of 30 are actually degree holder. they enlist with a diploma, go thru OCS and aply for LSA or other scholarship, study and come back to serve their bond. of course, u will climb if ur superior is good. if ur superior is f-up, no matter what scholar or whatever-lar u r, u will still be a farmer

edwin3060 SG

It is based both on your academic ability and attitude/leadership qualities ba. Diploma or A level doesnt really make a difference--Both can get the SAF Merit Scholarship. I have a friend from poly who got the SMS. But your poly results have to be good. Regardless, if you show SOME academic ability, and want to go to Uni, and your attitude/leadership is there, they will at the very least offer you an LSA ba. However, the SMS/SAS have a 6 year bond and the LSA have a 4 year bond. If you don't wanna be bonded and have enough money to go uni on yourself, just sign on 3 years contract, which I think starts as soon as you get your 2LT.

BUTTTT... before you think of all these, get into OCS first.

cookiecookie SG

1) I don't think majority of the degree holders get their MAJ below 30. Most I know get it at 32. Someone on top said he knows 2 degree holders get theirs at 31.

2) No one considers LSA or ATA "scholarship". They are also farmers.

SpecOps87 SG

1) I don't think majority of the degree holders get their MAJ below 30. Most I know get it at 32. Someone on top said he knows 2 degree holders get theirs at 31.

2) No one considers LSA or ATA "scholarship". They are also farmers.

Yeah, thats what my pilot trainee fren told me too.Only SAFOS and President Scholar are Scholars.Just wondering if SAF recongnizes degrees from say RMIT,UOL etc.?

blitzonic SG

Actually i don't think there's much prejudice between tertiary academic qualifications in military promotions. Regular farmer officers usually make MAJ between 29 & 31, unless they're really condemned. 31 is already behind pace, as it is. Conversely, it'll be those fast-tracked youknowwhos who rise faster.

If you can make it to OCS in the first place. Even if you sign on & get commissioned, you'll likely have to serve two separate "tours" with a combat unit (as PLT & COY commanders), with alternating stints at the formation school in between (in addition to upgrading courses) before you can make MAJ. With NSFs peopleing the combat units, each experience can be a lifetime in itself & anything can happen (in possibly blackmarking your career record).

cookiecookie SG

Yeah, thats what my pilot trainee fren told me too.Only SAFOS and President Scholar are Scholars.Just wondering if SAF recongnizes degrees from say RMIT,UOL etc.?

Yeah in SAF only SAFOS are scholars. President's scholars in the SAF are also SAFOS. PS is an icing on the cake, a bonus-top up scholarship given to the best 2 to 4 scholarship holders of the year and it is concurrently awarded with the SAFOS, SPFOS or OMS.

And it's very competitive too. I know that SAFOS are generally very competitive against each other. And non-PS SAFOS express insecurity about PS SAFOS. Non-MAP SAFOS express insecurity about MAP SAFOS. It's very weird to us. Even in their world, they feel a lot of competitiveness with each other.

If anyone wants to verify that only SAFOS are scholars in SAF, just go to SAF and ask the holder of any of the other study awards if they consider themselves scholars. If can find any, then that person is seriously shameless. Only SAFOS have their careers tracked by the top brass on close watch.

I did ever meet a LSA medicine award holder who told me that he is a 'scholar' with beaming pride. He was telling me in the context of when we were talking about a friend of mine who is a SAFOS cum PS in the army that I thought perhaps he may know. He hinted that he feels he was in the same league as my friend and said "Yeah you know, we scholars, we have a lot of pressure on us after all that the organisation invested". So far he is the only one farmer i have met who displays this delusion so glaringly.

He may like to know that maybe he could go out and fool a few stray cats (xiao mao) and maybe some girls from ITE but not me and most of the SG population. The medicine LSA is equivalent to the LSA in prestige or lack of prestige, don't think there is a slight edge even and worse, all my NUS doctor friends say that it's possibly the worst career path a doctor can take because in medicine, your experience in actually treating patients is the most valued and worth the highest currency and integral to your specialising fate, which is why the houseman years are the hardest and housemen are treated as slaves by real doctors.

One of my NUS doctor friends even said of the sign on docs "Everyone in NUS knows that it's condemned and no self respecting doctor signs on to be military doctor cos all they ever do for their career is treat chao keng guys with imaginary illnesses and at the end of the road, that's all they have as clinical experience."

Another told me in local universities and med fraternity, the ones who sign on with that LSA are looked upon poorly which is why there's many more of the awards offered than takers. He said SAF has had a problem getting enough people to apply for the medicine LSA hahahah is that true? Can someone pls confirm?

caleb_chiang SG

with your type of attitude, you would not succeed... just serve and f off...

cookiecookie SG

All universities in the SAF list that is recognised are accepted and there's no prejudice between say, someone from NUS or someone from NTU. No such thing as they promote the guy from NUS faster. The list of Australian schools that SAF sends its ATA holders (now 'renamed' to a snazzier sounding SAS) are definitely recognised together with the 2 local universities. Otherwise why would SAF send the ATA people there?!

BUT, SpecOps87 has a valid point. The 2 schools he asked about are correspondence degrees and I know government sector and government affiliated agencies like GLCs and Stat Boards do not recognise. Can someone confirm whether correspondence degrees are recognised by SAF?

All the farmers i know got their MAJ at 31 to 32. I think the farmers you know are better than the farmers I know.

blitzonic SG

TS, get a taste of NS life first.

The SAF commissions only combat officers, so you'll definitely need to clock in the requisite hours with frontline units if you sign on with them. Those frontline units are mostly staffed by NSFs & have operational obligations, so even as you shall be able to afford material comforts (like a car to travel around), your working life will be centered around their training timetables 24/7.

In other words, no nights-off during their BMT; lotsa standbys & the ilk during active time; yearly jungle-training EXs if you're in infantry; DO duties all year around, etc. - you'll be doing them as a LTA & CPT. Are you prepared to handle all these, say for 4 years of your first 6 years?

del_co SG

with your type of attitude, you would not succeed... just serve and f off...

many ppl think of using the SAF as a stepping stone...i have a fren who is doing tt. and when his LSA-bond ends, he intends to do property marketing. haha!

Borntolive. SG

i wonder if there are ppl like TS who sign on because of geninue interest in military relater matters.

Most sign on for scholarships, for starting pay or as a stepping stone for future non military related careers, After their bond these ppl cant wait fked off. As such their work attitude is CMI.

cookiecookie SG

many ppl think of using the SAF as a stepping stone...i have a fren who is doing tt. and when his LSA-bond ends, he intends to do property marketing. haha!

so fuck-ed up

superlibra SG

TS, get a taste of NS life first.

not necessarily have to clock in the requisite hours with frontline units for all combat vocations, that is if you know of combat units that have 99.99% of the times not in outfield.. The chiong-suas throughout ur OCS will still be necessary though..

fudgester SG

Here's a piece of advice I give to people who want to sign on:

Go through BMT first. Then after you've had a taste of the army life, go forth and decide whether this is the kind of life you want.

I don't want to sound harsh, but seriously speaking, TS, I've seen far too many people having all sorts of romantic notions about life in the army and wanting to go to OCS/CDO/SOF/NDU and what have you..... then on their first bookout they whimper and cry about the big bad 3SG who tekaned the whole platoon upside-down.

Really, at this point in time, you shouldn't even be thinking about becoming a MAJ by the age of 30 when you haven't even become an REC yet.

You want to go in with an open mind? Then do your BMT first and see what it's like. Then you may decide whether to sign on after that.

cookiecookie SG

What are combat units that 99.99% not outfield?! No pride man!

Guardx SG

To TS, if you can cross the low wall in the SOC then come and talk lar.