Friday, August 29, 2008

Final Thoughts on Signal BOLC III

I have to be a little careful on this one.. The Internet can sometimes take a wrong turn and have this pop up on the wrong screen. And there is more than enough information in this blog for it to be traced back to my real life (it has happened before).


But here is my final take-away..


The course, overall, served it's purpose. People such as myself had to muddle through basic material that we already knew (hello... MS in Computer Science with 10 years of industry experience) but there were a few things that I didn't know (mainly radios).

One interesting trend throughout both BOLC II and BOLC III was how keyed the course is at the Active Duty side. We are constantly told statements that start with, "when you finally get to your unit" or "the first time you are in front of your platoon." Very useful advice for the AD folks, not so much for those of us in the Guard, since most likely we have been doing that for at least 6 months, longer for some. We just roll with it and roll our eye's (exchanging glances with our fellow Guardsmen).

The field problem could use more relevant equipment, since it uses old stuff that no one, not even the reserves, uses anymore. But given that the priority is equipping the field units that obviously will take a backdoor until everyone else is equipped (though I am not sure Iquite agree, since it would make training much more useful). Though I guess it does a good job at giving a bit of a feel for things, though it depends on which track you went through how useful the training was.

Alright, that is it. No more talking of Army training for a couple of more years. Thank god I am done with TRADOC, after basically being under them for the past 3 years (minus a little break where I was with my unit).


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