oldag941 said:

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You lost me at a Latin salutation.

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You know where that salutation is from right?

Judging by the cadet reaction to all of this, I'd assume they didn't take the Cadet led organization approach when they decided on this. It's always do as I say and not as I do with Corps leadership. I haven't seen this many people angry about something A&M since Stoops and Sully.

I think some changes are needed. I'm open to it.
Everyone is freaking out and having knee jerk reactions because of nostalgia and "it's always been this way".

The cadets don't want this. The University wants as many kids and retention as possible for P.R, but then want to take the experience and fun out of it all and control every aspects of these kids lives. Then go around and complain when the donors tap runs dry and retention falls. If they want to make changes, get off of the tit of former students and cadets. When it fails and no one wants to join, they will know whose fault it is.

You will never retain your way to 3,000 cadets. Recruit better, celebrate and replicate outfits that have their **** together. Corps of Cadets is a great product - hire better people and sell it… fix the Hollingsworth Center - you already have the fish for 4 hours+ a week there.. this "transformational" change, that was done in secret with no consideration or notification of key constituents is fundamentally flawed. The corps of cadets is not the military. Over half of the cadets in it are not bound for the military. Building another fake service academy is the exact opposite of a growth initiative. 880 fish joined last year. Want to get to 3,000 cadets, hire better recruiters and recruit 1,000 fish next year. Want to improve leadership? Don't steal the opportunity for white belts to actually lead or steal the fish the good outfits worked hard to recruit.

Is not your Corps of Cadets anymore.

It's time to let it go.

It's all of our corps of cadets.. the ~84% of cadets that have been completed ignored deserve and rate the advocacy of their alumni.

I hear you. It's the wholesale structural change that breeds concern and questions. It's the foggy definition of the "problem" (I think the problem was called "observation") that breeds concern and questions. It's changing the experience of the fist fall semester (arguably the most important culture and experience-building semester in the Corps) that breeds concern and questions.

Statements like "This may turn out to be the transformational change that the Corps needs" breeds concern and questions. What is the problem with the corps that it needs transformational change? This is the first we've (former cadets) heard of problems so LARGE that they require transformational change. And the commandant has yet to complete 1 full school year in his role, yet has identified problems LARGE enough to require "transformational change"?

I respect that you relate these changes to the military, but this isn't the military. The majority of the Corps don't commission into the military. Changes in this organization need to be even more carefully considered since unlike business and the military, families PAY to participate in this. It's optional. They can walk or not send their students to the Corps at all. I don't know the recruiting figures, but I'd bet a large % come from families that have a parent or relative that was a former cadet. They sell their student on the experiences, stories, relationships that they had when they were in the corps. This puts that at risk, which will potentially work against whatever recruiting goal is established. (a sidebar is if the recruiting goal is 3,000, why? Are we working towards a number for the sake of a number? I don't understand where that number comes from and why it needs to be achieved. Another day, another conversation). Not to mention that I'm sure most of the funding / donations for the corps come from former cadets. This funding is given in support of the memories, experiences and relationships that those former cadets had. It will also be at risk if their corps is so transformationally changed.

I hear you, but I'm not sold.

If this was the plan for the planning, communication, rollout and execution, it has stumbled before crossing the starting line. I'd recommend backing up, better planning. Better effort to create "buy-in" from not only former cadets but current cadets. I'd recommend a phased approach to execution, after selling this to stakeholders in a much more succinct and clear way.

It's a military organization with military roots.

You want some Fortune 500 CEO to come and run the Corps of Cadets?

Formations, first calls, CQ, March-Ins, wearing uniforms, Unit PT, accountability, rank structure, drill, etc

What do you want the Corps to be?

It's not a military organization. It is an organization based in military structure. Take away the D&C cadets and the Corps probably gets dissolved into any other ROTC in America.

Texas A&M is a Senior Military College.

I'm not saying to take away D&C cadets.

My point is that it is not the military. It has military roots yes. Lots of things are based off of the military. But I was responding to the claim that "there have been monumental changes made in business, government, in education, in our military" etc etc.

Structural changes in the military are planned, briefed and implemented over a longer time and with plenty of input from many involved. When they changed to the BCT format from the typical Corps / Division etc, we all knew it was coming for a while. This proposal for the CoC is apparently being implemented this semester (identifying cadre for FOW, dorms to use etc). This is the first that stakeholders have heard.

In our business, any strategic changes to organization tend to roll out in a much more palatable way than this change has done.

That's my point.

I think the implementation will be next year, but the preceding actions will take place this semester. FOW is in August, so a lot of planning for Day 1 happens before cutting the corps loose this May. And it would be good to let the high school seniors know this semester, that the corps structure will change in August. This is a large change from what they thought they were getting into when they committed (or are considering committing).

I am a current member of the Corps of Cadets class of 26' and I see that these changes are wildly unpopular among the students at the moment. Many are upset because these changes pose a threat to outfit culture and disable the position of pissheads. Many current cadets believe that the comm staff want to rid the Corps of pissheads and make them whitebelts. This has been the belief since the rumor of brown belts and shoes instead of black shoes and belts. Among the colored belts and shoes I believe that black shoes are better for shine however I can live with that change. I am concerned about the quality of cadets the "new Corps" can produce especially since my outfit believes in excellence through effort. We do not expect perfection however we believe in perfect effort that will lead to perfection. Overall, I am worried about what quality of cadet will come from the "basic training" in fall semester because I have seen (and grown proud of) the progress of my fish and I can't do that if these rumors proceed to be true.

I also would like to add that this poses an interesting leadership challenge and opportunity for us current cadets to learn and experience something that has not happened since the 50s.

It's your Corps or Cadets.

Fight the good fight. Lean on the D&C Cadets.

I remember getting into a discussion and perhaps and argument if you will with the trigon and essentially got the uneasy feeling that if I fought on the topic more something would happen to my contract.

I'd rather the Corps return to more of a hard core military organization, that produced more officers, quality and quantity, that rivaled the academies.
Need better recruitment for sure.
I pretty sure there was something that Sen Cruz signed recently, that would help to push academy appointees to the Corps as an option.
There's a way all this can be navigated and executed, but everyone has to leave the emotions of what their experiences were, and do some forward thinking of what can be fixed and how to improve.
I know I was disappointed in my experiences, definitely was easier than I expected.

So they are reverting to Ol' Army days (1947) when they started the fish, all 1,500 of them, at the Bryan Air Field Annex. There were nine companies of them and they comprised the Training Regiment.

Nice!

SpartanChase26 said:

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I am a current member of the Corps of Cadets class of 26' and I see that these changes are wildly unpopular among the students at the moment. Many are upset because these changes pose a threat to outfit culture and disable the position of pissheads. Many current cadets believe that the comm staff want to rid the Corps of pissheads and make them whitebelts. This has been the belief since the rumor of brown belts and shoes instead of black shoes and belts. Among the colored belts and shoes I believe that black shoes are better for shine however I can live with that change. I am concerned about the quality of cadets the "new Corps" can produce especially since my outfit believes in excellence through effort. We do not expect perfection however we believe in perfect effort that will lead to perfection. Overall, I am worried about what quality of cadet will come from the "basic training" in fall semester because I have seen (and grown proud of) the progress of my fish and I can't do that if these rumors proceed to be true.

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So would you feel the same if you are selected as a Cadre for these fish thus making an impact on the entire fish class instead of just your outfit's 10-15 fish?

I served with plenty of academy grads and plenty of Aggies.. give me the Aggies every damn time!! X 1,000!!

freedomfighter11 said:

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I served with plenty of academy grads and plenty of Aggies.. give me the Aggies every damn time!! X 1,000!!

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I've served with Academy grads, grads of other senior military colleges, multiple ROTCs and OCS/WOCS grads.

Overall,imo, every place has their superstars and their losers, but the average out of A&M seems to be better. Ags (VT, Norwich and OCS) seem to better relate on initial assignment to the troops. Academy grads get their first taste of freedom on initial assignment and do some truly stupid stuff while also thinking they are God's gift to the US military.

My son is preparing for College, I hope he chooses A&M over one of the academies because I think the rest of the college experience that he gets at A&M is vitally important to a young officer and a person.

I just gave a high school kid similar advice.

You can commission and be surrounded by civilian girls and have legitimate football culture.

Oh and you are in Texas.

CT'97 said:

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That's Gen. Ramirez, our VP for student affairs and prior commandant. He's been pretty open about who he is on this forum.

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G-Ram has his own PR mutiny back in the day where the cadets raised their concerns outside of the quad.

I'd like to know how exactly he (or GRam) plans to address the white belt apathy when this change happens and subsequent white belt retention issues, particularly among D&C cadets. Contract cadets are attached at the nuts, so to speak, and everyone knows that. Perhaps, running off D&C is precisely the point. To some extent, for the trigon, D&C cadets serve no purpose and are a resource drain. In an ideal trigon world, every cadet is a contract cadet. These types of uprising is impossible with 100% contract cadets. I have never seen a commandant speak to how important D&C cadets are to the fabric of the corps. Remember they are the only ones that are there because they want to be there. Gluttons for punishment, if you will. They also pay more to be there.
Also, how come no one has addressed that this change (seeking to retain fish) helps the March to 3000.

From here: https://texags.com/forums/16/topics/3445138/replies/67015472

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Thank you sir and everyone else who is helping with this absolute disaster happening in the Corps right now. I'm a current pisshead and honestly the future is looking bleak.

Outfit culture is the one of the main things that makes me interested in the Corps and is a big reason I joined, I'm in a nall-male Army outfit. We've been silenced and put on the back burner by Commandant staff and corps staff, completely over run by the new Commandant.

He told the juniors and seniors in a meeting one Friday PT that they were a "lost cause" and said that trying to convince them of what he was trying to push was fruitless because he knew they wouldn't agree with it as it would kill the Corps.

He has meetings with the fish every Monday morning (Which interrupts outfit PT) shoving this new agenda down their throats which is odd because they already have a SOMS class for that but I guess it's not enough. He tried a Friday meeting in the morning (Which interrupted training time) with the pissheads but got hissed the entire time and never showed his face at one again.

So now we get have no morning formations during the week except for Mondays (BUT THE FISH AREN'T EVEN THERE). We can't smoke the freshmen and instill discipline for their mess ups except for when the stars alline throughout the week. We can't push them during formation for their mess ups.

Our training times have been cut in half and are heavily regulated now. All of these changes have made me and my buddies extremely apathetic towards the Corps as a whole, but not to our outfit.

I fear that if these changes go through and we are split up in different dorms and hallways, and the fish are in their own dorms, outfit cultures as a whole will disappear within a year or two and every outfit will be the same apathetic, just here for the scholarship, do as little as possible outfit.

There was recently a poll on one of the Corps main meme pages called "Qadets" on Instagram asking people if they agree with the change and the results were a staggering 1230 to 54 not in favor of the changes. It's a very scary time and I encourage you to stay strong for us and the future of the Corps!

TRUST ME WE ARE IN FULL SUPPORT OF GETTING RID OF THESE CHANGES BUT A MAJORITY ARE WORRIED OF THE REPERCUSSIONS THAT WOULD EFFECT OUR FUTURE IN THE CORPS AND THE MILITARY. That's why I'm so grateful for you all. Best, P.H 26'

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EDITED FOR FORMATTING - TEXT IS THE SAME...


I KNOW SOME OF YOU ARE FOR THIS... YOU AREN'T GETTING THE WHOLE STORY.

Imagine taking the word of a 19-20 year old who is proud to have hissed at a retired general so now he "won't show his face" anymore as gospel.

Comical to act like you should be able to discipline fish at will when you can't even hold your peers to a level where they can listen and work against a change effectively.

There's zero way an organization that's apparently gotten to a point where sophomores feel comfortable to just boo the commandant out of a meeting is preparing cadets for the private sector or public service near as effectively as it should be.

CharlieBrown17 said:

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Imagine taking the word of a 19-20 year old who is proud to have hissed at a retired general so now he "won't show his face" anymore as gospel.

Comical to act like you should be able to discipline fish at will when you can't even hold your peers to a level where they can listen and work against a change effectively.

There's zero way an organization that's apparently gotten to a point where sophomores feel comfortable to just boo the commandant out of a meeting is preparing cadets for the private sector or public service near as effectively as it should be.

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Canary in a coal mine.

Comical to think that a Trigon that would not only allow some person who decided he is a girl DICTATE the entire Corps play pretend or ELSE, but also they put that person in Charge of an outfit as the sitting CO.

This has not ever even been brought to light even though most of us parents have known about it for 9+ months.

But it is telling that you pulled one tiny sentence out of that whole description of what is going on and decide to focus on that.

Point is, if this Commandant continues his ways, the Corps will cease to exist.

If y'all don't care about that, then I can't help you...

Aggie Therapist said:

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I will never forget what one of my most respected Army ROTC instructors said, CAG now, told me when I was a cadet.

We were talking about peer leadership and struggles with getting people to stay motivated and physically fit.

"Well it's hard because you have non-regs in your formation"

"Oh no sir, they are called D&C"

"Yeah, nonregs"

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Ha ha, real funny.

Without D&C, who make up the majority of the Corps, if the Corps existed at all, it would be a tiny fraction of what it is today.

Strong Men Armed said:

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Regarding the service academies, this is not true. At USNA, plebes (what they call fish) are assigned to a company their first year, and then assigned to a different company at the beginning of their second year, usually staying in that company until they graduate.

There is lifelong association with your classmates with whom you began your USNA journey… same as fish buddies at Texas A&M. This is reinforced by the fact that every graduate is commissioned in either the Navy or Marine Corps upon graduation and serves 5 years active duty. And… no one "frogs in" to the Brigade of Midshipmen.
Neither experience is better than the other. Going in, you know the expectations. Both institutions produce outstanding officers.
Full disclosure: I did 3 semesters at USNA, then graduated and commissioned into the USMC via NROTC. Later, did a tour at the Trigon as an instructor/outfit advisor. So I have some first hand knowledge of both schools.

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I went through TBS with most of that year's academy grads. It seemed most of them went USMC as a way to escape the Navy. They hid their rings. Some had buddies - but many immediately jumped at the chance to be around non-Annapolis types. And the Corps had significant deprogramming & OCS level training to perform on many.

When you consider how selective the service academies get to be and their resources: it's amazing how poorly they do.

I would NOT hold them as a model to emulate.