I'm not going to miss him one bit.

Class of '99 here.

Hopgood was the devil for me. Got rid of all the events that made the Corps fun and enjoyable. (Flight of the Great pumpkin, fish running on the quad, and a lot of little things..)..

Never met his replacement but I served under Col Grooves. He was a great mentor for me and one of my favorite Bull. I went to his retirement and he was the senior officer in my field training.

So that all being said. I trust Col Grooves and I am sure they are changing the Corps in the right direction.

As long as the emphesis is lead.. lead .. lead.. Soldier, Statesmen and Knightly Gentlemen/woman..then the Corps will be fine.

The Corps is suppose to change over time.. that is what makes it relevant.

GI, I recall thinking your class got it soft compared to mine. Mostly due to all the changes Hopegood made.. it sounds like you turned out alright.

(I will tell you that I have 3Lts that work for me from the academy and so far not impress with their performance.. one just got a a DUI)

Talon 12 Forever

[This message has been edited by Ambres (edited 1/25/2010 7:13a).]

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[This message has been edited by GI (edited 1/27/2010 4:52p).]

As one of the classes that had both Hopgood and Van Alstyne, I say good riddance to Van Alstyne! He was certain he could micromanage his way to the Corps being USMA.

For the touchy-feely kid who liked his hug during graduation: When I graduated, there were 120 cats graduating/commissioning that day. Van Alstyne was at the end of the stage, and shook hands with the graduating cadets. But not all of them. He would stand up and walk over to certain cadets, then turn and walk back to his seat to ignore others. I am not making this up. I was relieved of my Corps company command for voicing an opinion about how the outfit was doing. The next day, I was kicked out of my outfit and banished to the Regiment Staff for questioning the process. That's the kind of leadership Van Alstyne groomed.

To PV2010: When (if) you get out to the force, you will welcome hands-off leadership. It's called "command" vs. "control". The more an officer controls, the less he commands (micromanagement) and the less subordinates can be effective. It's hard to see as a cadet, but if you go into active duty you will welcome the commander rather than the controller.

I agree 100% with all of this:

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Right, because grades had never been a requirement before. That was heavy sarcasm if you couldn't tell.

And the Corps was being run by the CTs? THE HORROR! We obviously can't have a leadership lab where the guys in it get a chance to do any leading.

How about the more accurate description of the VanA reign of terror?

He turned the commandants office into a retirement home for all his buddies, and brought a level of micromanagement not seen since Stalin's Soviet Union. He took all possible decisions away from the cadets, went ballistic over the tiniest complaint from a worried mommy, and put commissars (bulls) into every dorm to be Big Brother.

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Puravida you are cracking me up. You aren't quite as wise as you think you are.

Puravida,

If you are 2010, that means you were a fish during the great VanA debacle when he made every unit furl their guidons and made the upperclassmen remove their Corps Brass.

And you will recall the whole episode was spawned by one momma panicking over their treatment of their poor baby. A panic that was proven totally unjustified.

Now tell us again how VanA let the Cadets run the Corps?

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In response to recruiting, outfits recruit on their own initiative on top of the many Corps Recruiting programs. He does not "send" people to outfits unless the prospective cadet requests it. The good outfits have no problem recruiting. Capitalism at its best. Nonethless, he will help outfits stay afloat if need be.

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I was sq 17 class of 2004. My brother is currently in that outfit. When he came for his new student orientation, he had multiple bulls and then Van Alstyne himself tell him that he should not join that outfit. He was told it was very unlikely he would be able to get a pilot slot in the outfit, his grades were too good so he wouldn't fit in, every excuse in the book to discourage him. Every freshman that tried to join the outfit went through the same thing. As a result the outfit is down from over 100 members when I was in it to around 50. Out of the 11 people in my brother's class, 9 were legacy which is the only reason they still wanted to join.

Why would you bleed an outfit dry like that. If there is a legitimate reason, just disband the outfit. It ruins the experience for people that are in it to destroy their recruiting classes and shrink the outfit down.

I have heard of and experienced several other examples where I disagree with how he ran the corps, can't say I am sad to see him go.

GVA hates us 17'ers Barnes, that's been going on awhile

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How are cadets supposed to learn how to lead if they're constantly micromanaged by the bulls?

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+1

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For the touchy-feely kid who liked his hug during graduation: When I graduated, there were 120 cats graduating/commissioning that day. Van Alstyne was at the end of the stage, and shook hands with the graduating cadets. But not all of them. He would stand up and walk over to certain cadets, then turn and walk back to his seat to ignore others.

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Yeah, he shook the hand of the cadet directly in front of me and then turned around and went back to his seat and snubbed me. Can't say I wanted to shake his hand anyway, but my grandfather (class of 46) who was in attendance was pretty irritated by it.

That sort of favoritism BS at a public venue like graduation should have been reason enough to fire his butt.

What is he, 12 years old?

What Barnes04 said +3rd Brigade (L1,D1,K1) E-1 might as well be a MajorUnit itself.

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[This message has been edited by GI (edited 1/27/2010 4:52p).]

Woner if my classmate, MG David Rubenstein, Devil D-1 Class of '77, would be interested in the position? He's about ready to retire. Would they let an old MSC officer be Commandant?

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[This message has been edited by GI (edited 1/27/2010 4:53p).]

Regarding the recruiting situation - Speaking as a former CO, "capitalism" may not be the best description.

There are caps on every outfit and GVA is on record, though I can't remember where, stating that he would not accept a freshman class of 700 (as in he would reject people until he got it under that number). Furthermore, he changed the caps so that they didn't vary from outfit to outfit (based on what they can support), they are now uniform across the corps except in extremely special cases.

It even looks kind of like communism in practice. Just look at summer recruiting towards the end or even in the middle some times. In practice, once an outfit hits its cap it quits recruiting, sometimes they will even stop showing up depending on the quality of the individual CO and recruiting officer. I know, I've been here to see it.

Either way, the recruiting situation has only gotten worse every year he has been here. In the last four years we have slowly approached 600 new fish a year, this year, from what I understand we may finally fall below.

Some have theorized (including the current Asst. Commandant for Recruiting) this may be a breaking point that could destroy the Corps almost comletely as university budgeting and space (read dorms) is based on our actual head count. As our budget shrinks we lose money for operations and recruiting creating a spiral effect. Furthermore, the university already thinks our housing practices are extremely uneconomical, and they are. (We house by outfit, gender, and class year, the only dorms on campus to do so.) This could be offset if we had enough students to pay for it but we can't even fill the quad. We're short two dorms and the top floor of another never mind the empty rooms spread out across the quad. The university, in a budget crunch itself, sees that as lost revenue. We have always had complaints from the non-regs about morning formation. They are currently dismissed but who is to say they don't magically have a point if we lose another whole dorm? Losing morning formation would be disastrous. And there's more to that laundry list of issues...

Long story short, whether it is right or wrong (in my opinion the whole recruiting process is screwed up) we are definately NOT running a capitalistic recruiting system. We're not even running a decent socialist system.

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[This message has been edited by GI (edited 1/27/2010 4:53p).]

The current Corps DOES place new cadets in outfits according to their major, to some degree. Each outfit is designated as either "technical" or "non-technical"... after that, you have some tech outfits that are mostly certain kinds of engineering majors, some that are math and hard science, etc... while the non-tech outfits are also grouped by similar majors. We also have an outfit that is purely architecture (A-2), and an ag outfit (c-1).

One of the big reasons for the disparity in the size of the outfits is the number of tech outfits vs the number of non tech outfits. Case in point: The Army ROTC units of the Corps comprise three brigades with a total of 12 outfits. Of those 12 outfits, only three of them are designated as Tech outfits, but you have seven non-tech outfits, then the aforementioned A-2 and C-1. Couple this with the fact that the majority of the fish that come into A&M these days have technical majors, and you can see where an outfit like E-1 (tech outfit) will have 80 or 90 cadets. One way to "leaven out" the numbers between the units is to create more tecnical units, either by creating new units or changing some units that are currently designated as non-tech.

CanyonAg77, just a correction, E2 is almost half the size it was when I was in 99-03. We averaged around 110 cadets, they are somewhere around 50-60 now. Van Alstyne HATES E-2.

Glad he is gone.

So if these so called "designated" outfits are meant for just these majors, why not get rid of the outfits that were servicing this very purpose but did recruit fish of other majors (there's more that meets the eye than a major). I think its stupid to build these outfits up so high while you have others that have an embarassing 8 person march-in block. (These outfits also won top recruiting awards and busted their asses to get good fish) See where I'm getting at?

[This message has been edited by SpiDer2008 (edited 1/25/2010 10:27a).]

Rebel E, sorry to pick on you. E-2 in years past always seemed to be HUGE, so it was an easy target.

Others brought up attrition/retention. It seems like he also brought a "retention at all costs" attitude in, to the detriment of quality. I'll let the more current cadets comment on that.

Just FYI, the Service Academies, even with a nationwide pool of highly qualified candidates, amazing support from their officers and professors, and a full ride scholarship plus salary paid to cadets...

...have an attrition rate of about 25%.

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he current Corps DOES place new cadets in outfits according to their major, to some degree. Each outfit is designated as either "technical" or "non-technical"... after that, you have some tech outfits that are mostly certain kinds of engineering majors, some that are math and hard science, etc... while the non-tech outfits are also grouped by similar majors. We also have an outfit that is purely architecture (A-2), and an ag outfit (c-1).

One of the big reasons for the disparity in the size of the outfits is the number of tech outfits vs the number of non tech outfits. Case in point: The Army ROTC units of the Corps comprise three brigades with a total of 12 outfits. Of those 12 outfits, only three of them are designated as Tech outfits, but you have seven non-tech outfits, then the aforementioned A-2 and C-1. Couple this with the fact that the majority of the fish that come into A&M these days have technical majors, and you can see where an outfit like E-1 (tech outfit) will have 80 or 90 cadets. One way to "leaven out" the numbers between the units is to create more tecnical units, either by creating new units or changing some units that are currently designated as non-tech.

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There are several problems with this.

First, there is a disparity but the difference between 30 (the current cap for outfits) and 10 is, in truth not that much when you consider that my dad can remember having 50 in his fish class where other outfits had 10. Disparity is not the problem. Outfits truly based on major and legacy would have disparity as well but it would vary from year to year and could be broken down into different outfits to even it out if absolutely necessary (like they used to if you go far enough back).
Second, yes it is true that we have some groupings according to majors. Outfits with specific majors like C-1 and A-2 seem to do alright for themselves (and one could make an argument for Sq-20, the pre-professional outfit). Also, to clarify A-2 is coupled with the architecture school, not simply architecture majors. Thus the large number of construction science majors currently present there. And it should also be pointed out that both outfits have a steady stream of fish but I've never seen them cap out and I've been there since they were created and I know they didn’t cap this year.
I would disagree with your reason why E-1 has such high numbers. E-1 recruits well because they're the jock outfit. If you look at their majors you will notice that there aren't that many actual engineers or even technical majors necessarily there. There are quite a few who walk in with legacy ties or just want to be in that outfit. I should also mention that technical outfit is just another way of saying an outfit that takes engineering majors and turns them into poly sci majors by second semester fish year. It happens constantly. Also, tech and non tech is a non binding designation. Its just not always enforced. The truth about recruiting is that outfits with a niche do well but this is beside the point.
The overall recruiting system needs to be overhauled. Yes, incoming cadets should be able to request units but recruiting by outfit will ultimately bankrupt us as we compete for replacements among ourselves. What ever happened to "per unitatem vis" anyway? If the corps itself must recruit without the university's help (a point I fundamentally disagree with), then we should do it as a corps and distribute fish according to major, and legacy ties. This would ensure a system that would probably enhance retention as well. Besides, having outfits recruit misses some fundamental points about recruiting that even the military understands, primarily that we are not recruiting, WE ARE SELLING A PRODUCT. In this case, that product is leadership development coupled with lifelong friendships (AKA networking). And, it also fails to address the fact that cadets in general have neither the time or expertise to be real recruiters similar to your average foot soldier.


[This message has been edited by jdfoster (edited 1/25/2010 10:38a).]

[This message has been edited by jdfoster (edited 1/25/2010 10:41a).]

I agree with CanyonAg. When you have a blind cadet that gets caught with weed and not kicked out yet a good cadet that gets kicked out for a flask he forgot he had in his jacket...there's something seriously wrong. Special cases don't mean special treatment. Especially getting momma involved. What happens in the corps, stays in the corps. "You live, you learn, you grow to be a better person."

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[This message has been edited by GI (edited 1/27/2010 4:54p).]

Haha, Spider, funny story about the blind cadet, and I know the kid, great kid, great family. Anyway, no shiite, when he got caught with the weed, he literally said, "What? I don't see any weed."

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I just hope the new commandant cleans up some of the racist staff Van Alstyne kept around.

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How so? I never felt that the staff was racist and I am Hispanic. They were always professional and never had any problems with it.

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Watch E-2 march in with 150 cadets, while other outfits have 20 people.

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My outfit was one of those with few cadets my fish year. It didn't start to grow until my butt year.

Oh, and 2nd BDE should have never been split.
Dorm 6- The Last Castle

Yeah, I heard that too. I had no beef with the kid, he was alright. Just the system I didn't agree with. In my mind, everyone should be judged by the same system. Just cuz your fat, wag, blind, ect. doesn't mean you get special treatment. I garauntee you the real world the corps is suppose to get you ready for isn't going to treat you special.

I agree, Spider. Did you ever see the article about him in the Quadrangle or Guidon? A full page. It seemed like publicity to me.

[This message has been edited by HBCanine08 (edited 1/25/2010 10:50a).]

Oh you're right, the system is a joke. Whether it can be fixed is something I don't know if is possible. I'd like to think it is, I mean the Corps is something that helped shaped my views and what have you. But at the same time, it's a broken system.

I can't say I ever saw it but I'm not suprised.

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[This message has been edited by GI (edited 1/27/2010 4:55p).]

What about something like asthma that the military doesn't permit? I had a buddy in another outfit who got into USMA, but couldn't get cleared for asthma.

He led a lot of runs for his outfit and never had a real problem with it in the CoC

Not trolling, just want to know your thoughts on it.

[This message has been edited by HBCanine08 (edited 1/25/2010 11:09a).]

I see what you're saying but there is a fine line between medical and discipline. Medical should be fine since the Corps supplies both D&C and contract as long as the outfit knows about it (ie. heart condition over-running that led to F-1's dismissal). Its discipline I'm talking about.

discipline=push ups

modified position