Hello Everyone,

I hope the anyone, recruiter, actual member or prior service member will be able to help me with my questions here.

I am currently on active duty (ARMY) and I am looking into joining the ANG or AFR. I will have 15 years of service by the time I finish my current contract. (4 years Reserve and 11 active duty).

My priority will be to join as a Technician or AGR if possible. If not, then I will go to school full time since I have the G.I. Bill.

My wife is a NY State school teacher with 12 years of service.

I will be willing to join any Guard or Reserves unit in NY, NJ or PA. Yet I will be willing to go anywhere in the nation as long as it can be AGR or Tech. I still need to find out which organization will be better for me cause of my rank, etc.

My current MOS is 14E (PATRIOT systems operator and maintainer) with Secondaries MOS's 11B (Infantry) 14J (Aviation Armament repairman and operator) and 92W (Water Purification Specialist)

My questions are:

Will I be able to hold my current rank of E-6 in the ANG or AFR?

I will be 46 years old by the time my contract expires. Will my age hold against me? I am in top physical shape and health. (actually look way younger thanks I guess to Army PT).

Will I have to take the ASVAB and get a new job again? Last ASVAB I took was DEC 06. I will not mind to change and go admin, work in the flight line or as aircrew.

I am wondering if this will be rather hard for me to join the ANG or AFR since I have all this years of service and pay grade. ???

I love the military but with multiple deployments to Iraq of over 15 months will brake my family. 90 day or 180 days + or - tours will be a walk on the park for me and my family.

I want to continue to serve our country in uniform for as long as I can. I will be deploying to Iraq, again, soon.

I certainly appreciate all you answers.

Thanks!
jc

First, thank you for your service in the U.S. Army. I am currently an ANG member and have been for 6 years. I will answer some of your questions that I know something about, if not, YukonDogg is a mod and a reserve recruiter and he can pipe in and give you his take also.
As far as full time jobs(AGR or Tech), usually you have to become a member of the particular unit that has the open job. This means you may have to spend some time as a traditional member in the unit, which if you are contemplating going to college, then this would be the time. The AFR and ANG are both very friendly in regards to you getting an education while being a traditional member. Once you have joined a unit and picked a job, you can then apply through the given processes to be hired on full time. Most jobs nowadays are technician, although there are some AGR vacancies as well.
As far as choosing a career-field to join into...given your former and current MOS from the Army, you sound like a technical sort of guy. Any aircraft maintenance positions, aircraft armament, or munitions sounds right up your alley. There are frequent openings in the maintenance field for both full time and traditional positions. Living where you do and the states you listed you would be willing to join, you will find many flying wings where there will be a lot of opportunity.
As far as rank, a majority of Tech and AGR positions are E-6 slots, so I dont see you having to reduce in rank to accept a position. Overages are common in the ANG as well, and with your prior service, you shouldnt have a problem keeping your grade.
You will not have to take the ASVAB again unless your current score is lower than the minimum score needed for a particular job. If a job tickles your fancy, research the AFSC and see what ASVAB score it needs to enter.
The ANG is very friendly towards prior service and is fairly easy to cross over into. Almost half of my shop I work in now started in another branch of service and came to the Air Force, as a matter of fact, we have a former marine, army, and navy guy, so we have all of it covered. The ANG and AFR do deploy, but its usually 30-120 day rotations with the opportunity to rotate out at 60 days on long trips. Its not all desert trips either, I have been to some amazing places and the only sand I saw was on a day trip to a nearby beach.
With your 15 years in, it would be easy to go 5 more in the ANG, AFR, and get that magical 20 years and have some retirement pension to look forward to later on. I say go for it. Check out www.goang.com and see which unit you would like to join. Contact their recruiter and give them your situation and then see what they say. I am not sure about your age and how it fits into the mix, but a recruiter will know and lead you in the right way. The Air force is great, and I think you will really like it, should you choose to do so.

Here is me Piping in ! LOL

Most of that info is the same for the USAF Reserve, if you have not thought of it yet, check out MA for another fairly close destination of bases you might want to consider.

Your years are fine, but at 16 years, you can no longer cross train for the Reserve, unsure about the Guard. You would have to select a new MOS as none of the ones you have cross to the AF.

Age, not an issue, you are fine there.

Rank, well this could get tricky, they normally don't like to take E-6 or higher without a direct MOS transfer, meaning you have something that is similiar to what we do and by our regulations of what MOS's transfer to our AFSC's.

AC Maintenance is a very good way to go for full time ART spots.

What part on NY are you in ?

Thank you both for your very valuable information and kind remarks. I greatly appreciated. I am from Astoria,(Queens) NY. I am currently in Ft. Bragg, NC. I am about to deploy again in a few days.

I wish I knew what I know now back in 2006. I would have join the ANG then instead of re-enlisting. Oh well!!! what can you do, when you don't know you don't know. I was lucky to learn more from some AF vets that I met last year while at Ft. Bliss, TX.

Anyways, Sounds like I may loose my E-6. I will try not too. My very first MOS was aviation ordnance (4 years active NAVY). When I first join the military thats what I did, both organizational level and intermediate maintenace.

I know that MOS can be transfered to the AF, I looked it up. It has been quite a few years then but most of my work has been as a technician and with weapons so I will try to stick to that. So armament is my line of duty.

I will not mind getting into something new though, Aircrew member on a AMC or air gunner sound quite good too. we will see, thanks again for your kind advice.

JC

PS. I will consider MA too.

quote:

Originally posted by korszo:
Hello Everyone,

I hope the anyone, recruiter, actual member or prior service member will be able to help me with my questions here.

I am currently on active duty (ARMY) and I am looking into joining the ANG or AFR. I will have 15 years of service by the time I finish my current contract. (4 years Reserve and 11 active duty).

My priority will be to join as a Technician or AGR if possible. If not, then I will go to school full time since I have the G.I. Bill.

My wife is a NY State school teacher with 12 years of service.

I will be willing to join any Guard or Reserves unit in NY, NJ or PA. Yet I will be willing to go anywhere in the nation as long as it can be AGR or Tech. I still need to find out which organization will be better for me cause of my rank, etc.

My current MOS is 14E (PATRIOT systems operator and maintainer) with Secondaries MOS's 11B (Infantry) 14J (Aviation Armament repairman and operator) and 92W (Water Purification Specialist)

My questions are:

Will I be able to hold my current rank of E-6 in the ANG or AFR?

I will be 46 years old by the time my contract expires. Will my age hold against me? I am in top physical shape and health. (actually look way younger thanks I guess to Army PT).

Will I have to take the ASVAB and get a new job again? Last ASVAB I took was DEC 06. I will not mind to change and go admin, work in the flight line or as aircrew.

I am wondering if this will be rather hard for me to join the ANG or AFR since I have all this years of service and pay grade. ???

I love the military but with multiple deployments to Iraq of over 15 months will brake my family. 90 day or 180 days + or - tours will be a walk on the park for me and my family.

I want to continue to serve our country in uniform for as long as I can. I will be deploying to Iraq, again, soon.

I certainly appreciate all you answers.

Thanks!
jc

I know the PA ANG is lookng for people. I currently switched from ARNG to ANG. I also got a 15k bonus. I am 34 and age wasnt used against me. BTW I also was 14e on active i was the very last 24t class ever to graduate FT Bliss. When did you go through training what units where u in. Also you might look at the afsc 1a3 in the PAANG. DO a google for commando solo or EC130J. It might all you to keep your rank or make higher. It is based out of harrisburg PA.

Wow! That's alot.
You will be hard pressed to keep E-6 coming into the Air Guard anywhere. The reg keeps you safe up to E-5 after that it's up to the commanders. Does it happen; yes, for cross trainees, NO.
Coming on full-time tech. or AGR is hard to do.
For NY google "DMNA" and look under jobs. It shows both Army and Air.
1C5X1 is one of the easiest to get AGR as an E-5. Google "NEADS" and take a look around. If you have time to chill as a traditional member for 2 years it's a good choice.(It's the easiest way into a AGR slot in NY Air Guard) Deployments for 1C5's at NEADS are virtually nil. (I've never seen or heard of them deploying as 1C5's)
They also have positions in Washington (State) and Alaska. You'd have to do a search to find their AGR website.
Coming from Army will be a tough sell so start working on a very strong package. I get beat up by the guys from Ft. Drum Everyday! I have no issues with the Army; but, when i have to sell army to one of these commanders for something like this they aren't to keen. You know what i mean. The public perception.

You won't be retaking the ASVAB; unless you want to. I doubt that you will need to.

Your Age is not a factor. You just need to be able to complete 20 years of service before age 60. Good there.

Army Guard Recruiting? AGR/Keep rank hmmmm

I was an Army Staff, and had to give up a stripe to cross over to be an Air Force Staff (6 to 5), but will make the stripe back as soon as training and skill level training is completed.

I've met many that went from 6 to 5, or 5 to 4 (usually 6 to 5) in order to fill the proper manning slot without issue.

I do know that PLDC and BNCOC do not cross over, as they are making me do the AF equivalent of PLDC via a correspondence course to keep even the E-5 stripe (you have 2 years to complete this).

I can say that I totally feel your pain on the deployment thing, and can dig the fact that you are ready to potentially piss away a retirement, even at your TIS, due to the Army's bass-ackwards way of treating it's deployable assets. These AF guys have it good...and when they deploy, they don't know how good they have it.

I now AM one of "those guys"

I do not regret making the switch ONE BIT.

Better gig on the blue side...hands down. I am in an aircrew slot on Herks in CA, and there are several units in New York that also have really neat jobs. Buffalo (albeit on the other side of the state) is switching airframes to the Herk from KC-135 re-fuelers. They have the potential for some interesting positions, and I know they are going to be looking for aircrew in the near future (I was just in school with several of them). Long Island has a Search and Rescue unit like my unit in California...neat work, and good people to work with.

The deal about being from the Army is bang-on, however. It was a hard sell to get me into this coveted aircrew slot, being from the Army. They have had bad luck with re-training Army guys in the past, so they definitely don't give Army troops the benefit of the doubt. You have to sell yourself, and as mentioned above, your package needs to be perfect if you are competing against other blue-suiters.

I have no NY specific advice/info, but just wanted to weigh in and say that I think that if you are going to pop smoke and disengage from he Army (and I understand why you are doing it), there are worse places you can end up than in the ANG/AFRC. There is a lot of opportunity over on this side of the fence, but it won't come out and find you...you will have to educate yourself, and call these units...and find the opportunities yourself.

I personally would find a point of contact in the local units other than the recruiters. Not saying to avoid the recruiters, but I'd rather ask my questions from the NCOIC of the shop vs. a recruiter who doesn't know much about the shop...only about the manning roster.

Good luck, and come back to the forum often., These are really good forums, and they are usually read by many knowledgeable NCO's who will never hesitate to pitch in their $0.02 of advice if you get stuck somewhere along your info-quest.

Thank You very much to all of you that have taken the time to give me so much advice and pointers toward my future interest and career. I have strongly decided to follow this goal and this makes my family and myself very happy. I know that I have a very strong potential, knowledge and experience that I can continue to exploit and maximize in the ANG/AFR.

I am currently back in Iraq and will be returning back to the states sometime next year. I will make every effort to acquire as much information, training and education in order to make my move. I know I may loose my E-6 but I know that this will only motivate me even more to work harder to get it back and supersede over the rank structure. I still remain flexible to find the right unit and location anywhere in the nation.

Thank you all once again for you kind advice.

SSG C